Facebook said the president’s claims violated its coronavirus
misinformation policy, in a rare departure from the social
network’s largely hands-off approach to politicians. Olivier
Douliery/AFP via Getty Images
Both Twitter and Facebook have removed a post shared by
President Trump for breaking their rules against spreading
coronavirus misinformation.
Twitter temporarily blocked the Trump election campaign account
from tweeting until it removed a post with a video clip from a Fox
News interview from Wednesday morning, in which the president urged
schools to reopen, falsely claiming that children are “almost
immune from this disease.”
Facebook also removed a post containing the same video from
Trump’s personal page. Both Facebook and Twitter said the post
violated their rules on COVID-19 misinformation.
Research has shown that while children tend to get infected with
the coronavirus less often and have milder symptoms than adults,
kids can still contract and spread it. Some have gotten seriously
ill and even died.
“This video includes false claims that a group of people is
immune from COVID-19 which is a violation of our policies around
harmful COVID misinformation,” said Andy Stone, a Facebook
spokesperson.
“The @TeamTrump Tweet you referenced is in violation of the
Twitter Rules on COVID-19 misinformation. The account owner will be
required to remove the Tweet before they can Tweet again,” said
Twitter spokesperson Trenton Kennedy.
The Trump campaign removed the tweet and has since been tweeting
again.
“The President was stating a fact that children are less
susceptible to the coronavirus,” said Courtney Parella, a
spokesperson for the Trump campaign, in response to the Facebook
removal. “Another day, another display of Silicon Valley’s flagrant
bias against this President, where the rules are only enforced in
one direction. Social media companies are not the arbiters of
truth.”
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That echoed what Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has repeatedly
said to critics who want him to crack down more on false claims
from politicians: that Facebook does not want to be the “arbiter of
truth.”
Facebook has taken down content shared by Trump before, but
Wednesday’s video was the first time it did so because of the
coronavirus misinformation policy.
Such removals are rare, because Facebook takes a largely
hands-off approach to posts from political figures. That stance
sets it apart from Twitter, which has added fact-checking and
warning labels to the president’s tweets and banned political
advertising altogether.
Facebook’s position has also generated criticism from civil
rights groups, Democratic politicians and even its own employees,
who have called on Facebook executives to hold politicians to the
same standards as other users.
An independent audit of Facebook’s policies published
last month slammed the company for prioritizing free expression
“over all other values.” Facebook And Twitter
Remove ‘Racist Baby’ Video Posted By President Trump
Live Updates: Protests For Racial Justice
Facebook And Twitter Remove ‘Racist Baby’ Video Posted By
President Trump
In recent months, Facebook has removed Trump campaign ads that
used a Nazi symbol as well as ads that made misleading claims about
the 2020 census.
In June, Facebook took down a post shared by President Trump
containing a doctored video of a “racist baby,” following a
copyright complaint from one of the children’s parents.