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Facebook suspends Trump’s account until 2023 (UPDATED)

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By Elizabeth Culliford (Reuters) -Facebook Inc on Friday suspended former U.S. President Donald Trump until at least January 2023 and announced changes to how it will treat world leaders who break the company’s rules on postings on its site. Facebook suspended Trump’s account the day after the Jan. 6 Capitol Hill riot, determining he had incited violence. That suspension will last at least two years from the date of the initial block and would only be lifted if the risk to public safety has receded, Facebook said. Trump criticized the decision as a form of censorship and an insult to his voter…

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TMV EDITOR’S NOTE:

In many ways Facebook’s decision to keep Trump’s account suspended is not a surprise: he is still touting the same kinds of lies (and they are exactly that) as he did when they suspended his account. Perhaps the biggest surprise was that Facebook axed the special treatment world leaders violated Facebook’s rules enjoyed up until this week. Trump is unrepentent and is even talking about being “reinstated” as President in August. That’s as likely as me losing weight after eating a pizza a day for a week.

Here’s some reaction to this news:

Hot Air’s Allahpundit:

If he wants to make them rethink this and let him back in early, he should start doing those trollish food videos where people prepare meals on the surface of their countertop.

Facebook loves that crap.

Maybe they’ll rethink it anyway when he’s reinstated as president in August.

You’ll recall that last month Facebook’s “Oversight Board” upheld his suspension following the insurrection but wrist-slapped the company for making that suspension indefinite. Normally, the board said, Facebook either suspends a user for a specific period of time or bans them permanently. Trump should get the same treatment. That placed Team Zuckerberg in an awkward spot: Since Trump is the frontrunner for the 2024 nomination and Republican campaigns stand to spend big bucks on advertising on the platform, did they really want to boot him off permanently?

They did not, it turns out. He’ll be back on January 7, 2023, two years to the day that his account was suspended. Coincidentally, right in time for the unofficial start of the 2024 presidential cycle….

Actually, let me rephrase that. He might be back on January 7, 2023.

Martin Longman:

Okay, so there’s a deterrent factor. They want to dissuade people from using their platform to attempt coups in the future. That makes sense. But I’m more focused on the other consideration: “the need for it to be long enough to allow a safe period of time after the acts of incitement.”

Facebook is saying that it’s not safe to publish Donald Trump’s words. They’re saying it won’t be safe to publish his word in six months, 12 months or 18 months. I agree.

I don’t think 24 months is some magic number, but their board insisted there had to be some upper limit. So the hope is that after two years, people will have calmed the fuck down about the 2020 election and they won’t respond to renewed calls for establishing an American dictatorship by killing Capitol police officers.

I actually applaud Facebook for explaining things this way. It makes things pretty clear. The president is a public safety danger.

I wish everyone else would internalize this truth and treat him accordingly. I hope the Justice Department utilizes this two-year window. This isn’t a joke. This is our country.