This illustrative photo shows former President Donald Trump’s Facebook page on a smartphone screen in Los Angeles March 17, 2023.
Chris Delmas | AFP | Getty Images
Ex-President Donald Trump posted on Facebook on Friday for the first time since the Jan. 6, 2021 Capitol riot that prompted the social media giant to suspend the then-president’s account for two years.
Trump, whose Facebook account was restored in January, was set to return to the Meta-owned platform and Twitter after both companies unbanned his profiles.
Trump’s 2024 Republican presidential campaign had officially begun requested Meta to recover his Facebook account. But as of Friday afternoon’s post, Trump clung to his own platform, Truth Social, as the preferred outlet for his campaign announcements and slanders against his political enemies.
“I’M BACK!” Trump captioned the new Facebook post above a 12-second video showing the former president speaking about Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton at a victory party on the night of his 2016 election victory.
“Sorry to keep you waiting – complicated business. Complicated,” Trump said in the clip.
The post was Trump’s first since the day of the Capitol riots, when a violent mob of his supporters stormed the US Capitol, temporarily derailing lawmakers’ efforts to confirm President Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory.
At least 1,000 people, many spurred on by false claims of widespread voter fraud that Trump had circulated in recent months, have been arrested on charges related to the riots, according to the Justice Department.
The 13 previous messages from Trump’s Facebook account were posted on January 6, 2021. The latest shows Trump urging his supporters in the Capitol to “remain peaceful.”
Two posts earlier, Trump slammed his own Vice President Mike Pence for “having the courage to do what should have been done” after Pence refused to participate in Trump’s effort to end his 2020 election loss by rejecting key votes of the electoral college.
friday earlier, youtube said it would remove his own restrictions on Trump’s account and allow him to post new videos.
A day after the riot in the Capitol, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced Trump would be suspended from Facebook, writing, “We believe the risks of allowing the President to continue using our service during this time are simply too great.” The company said in June 2021 that Trump would remain suspended for two years become.
The Republican former president is seeking the White House again in 2024 and currently has an overwhelming electoral lead among the few other candidates officially running in the GOP primary so far.
In January, Meta announced it would restore Trump’s Facebook and Instagram accounts, stating in a lengthy blog post that “by default, we let people have their say, even if what they have to say is distasteful or factually incorrect.” .
Twitter, which bought Elon Musk in a $44 billion deal last fall, decided to revive Trump’s account after the site’s new CEO conducted an unscientific Twitter poll on the issue.
Source : www.cnbc.com