White House says Trump ‘unlikely to change his stripes’ after Facebook ban

Even though Facebook announced on Friday it was extending its ban on Donald Trump’s account until 2023, the White House says it’s unlikely the former president will change his ways.

“It feels pretty unlikely that the zebra is going to change his stripes over the next two years,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters on Friday at a press briefing, adding: “Our view continues to be, every platform, whether it’s Facebook, Twitter, any other platform that is disseminating info to millions of Americans, has a responsibility to crack down in disinformation, has a responsibility to crack down on false information, whether it’s about the election or even about the vaccine.”

Ms Psaki implied that the former president’s conduct on the social network, where he frequently spread lies about the election and threatened his opponents, helped contribute to the 6 January riots at the Capitol.

“We learned a lot from the former president over the last couple years, about his behaviour and how he uses these platforms,” she said, noting: “We saw the impact on January 6 of words on social media platforms, and we’ve seen the impact of words as it relates to disinformation traveling around the vaccine, around election integrity.”

Donald Trump has been banned from Facebook for at least two years, the social media giant announced on Friday.

The former president was indefinitely suspended from all Facebook platforms in the wake of the 6 January US Capitol riot, in which his supporters violently tried to prevent the certification of Joe Biden’s election win.

Now Mr Trump’s account will remain suspended until 7 January 2023, and Mark Zuckerberg’s company says he will only get it back if the “risk to public safety has receded.”

Facebook’s independent Oversight Board upheld the initial suspension of Mr Trump last month, but they criticised the company over the indefinite time period, which led Mr Zuckerberg to introduce the new rules.

“Given the gravity of the circumstances that led to Mr Trump’s suspension, we believe his actions constituted a severe violation of our rules which merit the highest penalty available under the new enforcement protocols. We are suspending his accounts for two years, effective from the date of the initial suspension on 7 January this year,” said Nick Clegg, Facebooks VP of Global Affairs, on Friday.

The ex-president called the ban an “insult” and reiterated his bogus claim that the 2020 election was “rigged” in a statement on Friday.

“Facebook’s ruling is an insult to the record-setting 75M people, plus many others, who voted for us in the 2020 Rigged Presidential Election,” Mr Trump said in a statement on Friday.