Facebook is bracing for possible violence around Inauguration Day by blocking its users from creating pages on its platform that promote in-person events scheduled either in downtown Washington, D.C. or in state capitals near their legislative buildings, it said Friday.
“We are blocking the creation of any new Facebook events happening in close proximity to locations including the White House, the US Capitol building and any of the state capitol buildings through Inauguration Day,” Guy Rosen, Facebook’s vice president of integrity, and Monika Bickert, Facebook’s vice president for global policy management, said in a blog posted on the company’s official site.
Facebook is also conducting a “secondary review” of all event pages made on its social media service related to next week’s inauguration, they added.
President-elect Joseph R. Biden is to be sworn in Wednesday on the steps of the West Front of the U.S. Capitol, two weeks to the day since the building was stormed by mobs of people violent opposed to him taking office.
The FBI recently issued an internal bulletin warning about the possibility of armed protests taking place starting this weekend at capitol buildings across the country, several outlets reported Monday.
Federal investigators are aware of an “extensive amount of concerning online chatter” involving potential armed protests leading up to the inauguration, FBI Director Christopher A. Wray said Thursday.
“We’re monitoring for signals of violence or other threats both in Washington, D.C. and across all 50 states,” Mr. Rosen and Ms. Bickert wrote Friday. “We will continue to monitor and add additional measures as needed.”
• Andrew Blake can be reached at ablake@washingtontimes.com.
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