Twitter permanently banned President Trump, @realDonaldTrump, the company said on Friday evening.
“After close review of recent Tweets from the @realDonaldTrump account and the context around them — specifically how they are being received and interpreted on and off Twitter — we have permanently suspended the account due to risk of further incitement of violence,” said Twitter in a statement on its blog.”
Earlier this week, Twitter temporarily suspended Mr. Trump’s account and threatened a permanent suspension for future violations of its rules. The company restored Mr. Trump’s access after he deleted tweets that the company said violated its policies.
Then, on Friday, the company said it decided to permanently suspend Mr. Trump anyway.
“In the context of horrific events this week, we made it clear on Wednesday that additional violations of the Twitter Rules would potentially result in this very course of action,” said Twitter on its blog. “Our public interest framework exists to enable the public to hear from elected officials and world leaders directly. … However, we made it clear going back years that these accounts are not above our rules entirely and cannot use Twitter to incite violence, among other things.”
Twitter also said that the president’s offline decision not to attend the inauguration “is being received by a number of his supporters” as confirmation that the election was illegitimate. This decision led to the company’s determination that Mr. Trump’s tweets were “likely to inspire others to replicate the violent acts that took place on January 6, 2021,” said Twitter.
In addition to Mr. Trump, Twitter also booted some of his most prominent supporters on Friday. Twitter also suspended the accounts of Michael Flynn, President Trump’s former national security adviser, and Sidney Powell, pro-Trump lawyer, in accordance with its coordinated harmful activity policy.
• Ryan Lovelace can be reached at rlovelace@washingtontimes.com.
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