Trump Social Media Accounts Locked After Stoking Violence At Capitol Protests

President Donald Trump’s main megaphones to his supporters, his Twitter and Facebook and Instagram accounts, were locked and his video address to the Capitol protesters was removed from his YouTube account on Wednesday night.

In recent months all of these social media platforms have added disclaimers below messages like Trump’s alleging widespread voter fraud saying such claims are “disputed,” which many experts believe is not enough. 

The action from the sites comes as a result of Trump’s confusing minute-long video where he asks protesters to go home, but before that, insists that the presidential election was stolen from him. Trump’s video did little to calm the protests that hours before he openly supported. At 11 a.m., Trump spoke to thousands of the protesters who would soon storm the Capitol saying he would be “marching with them.” Later tweets from the president called those who stormed the Capitol “great patriots.”

Twitter initially only added their, now almost consistent, “disputed” disclaimer when Trump posted his video in which he refused to denounce the violence on Capitol Hill, instead lacing his message with false claims of voter fraud which drove the protesters to D.C. in the first place. Trump then tweeted further, “Remember this day forever!” and commended those “who have been badly & unfairly treated for so long,” in reference to the Capitol Hill protesters.

This led Twitter to lock Trump’s account. Once he deleted the two tweets, he would then be unlocked after 12 hours. Facebook and Instagram placed 24-hour bans on both Trump accounts. YouTube offered that Trump could re-upload his video as long as added additional “educational contexts.”

Twitter made the following statement on their decision: “Future violations of the Twitter Rules, including our Civic Integrity or Violent Threats policies, will result in permanent suspension of the @realDonaldTrump account. Our public interest policy — which has guided our enforcement action in this area for years — ends where we believe the risk of harm is higher and/or more severe.”