Twitter locked President Trump’s account on Wednesday after freezing three of his tweets about the riots at the U.S. Capitol so they could not be liked or forwarded. A couple of hours later, Facebook followed with a 24-hour block.
On Wednesday, Twitter locked Trump’s @realDonaldTrump account for 12 hours, requiring the removal of three of his recent tweets “for repeated and severe violations of our Civic Integrity policy,” the social media platform announced.
“As a result of the unprecedented and ongoing violent situation in Washington, D.C., we have required the removal of three @realDonaldTrump Tweets that were posted earlier today for repeated and severe violations of our Civic Integrity policy,” Twitter said in a statement. “This means that the account of @realDonaldTrump will be locked for 12 hours following the removal of these Tweets. If the Tweets are not removed, the account will remain locked.”
Twitter added that further violations of its policies “will result in permanent suspension of the @realDonaldTrump account.”
In addition, Facebook Newsroom announced via Twitter that it had “assessed two policy violations against President Trump’s Page which will result in a 24-hour feature block, meaning he will lose the ability to post on the platform during that time.”
After Facebook’s announcement, the head of Instagram, Adam Mosseri, tweeted that the social media platform was pursuing similar measures, writing, “We are locking President Trump’s Instagram account for 24 hours as well.”
