Social media users will now be able to comment on the case to permanently remove the 45th President’s Facebook and Instagram accounts. This followed a ruling made by Facebook’s Oversight Board during its first round of evaluations Thursday, in which the panel overruled four of five content removal decisions.
So far, Facebook’s board has received 150,000 cases to review.
Earlier this month, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said the ban of President Trump would continue until at least Inauguration Day. However, according to a statement from the social media giant last week, the Oversight Board has 90 days to reach a final decision on whether to uphold the ban on President Trump’s account or to restore it.
Calls from Democrats for Apple and Google to purge Telegram Messenger from their stores faced growing opposition.
“Providers like Facebook and Twitter aren’t legally liable for what their users post, but apparently Parler and Telegram are!” Paul Joseph Watson, the political commentator for Summit News, stated. “Different rule for different companies, even though they provide the exact same service.”
Facebook last week said the board would decide within the next 90 days whether to uphold or reverse the ban on Trump’s account. The company is extending the ban until the decision is announced.
Facebook made the decision to temporarily ban Trump on Jan. 7 after posts the company deemed to have incited the deadly riot at the Capitol the day before.
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said the ban would last until President Biden’s inauguration, and the oversight board announced shortly after it would take on the case.
Twitter has gone a step further than Facebook, putting in place a permanent ban on Trump’s account after the deadly riot.