Both Twitter and Facebook removed content from the account of U.S. President Donald Trump on Wednesday and suspended his account after he continued posting contents about the presidential election after protesters stormed the U.S. Capitol.
Twitter said the removal was for Trump's "repeated and severe violations of our Civic Integrity policy" and "as a result of the unprecedented and ongoing violent situation in Washington, D.C.."
In a video deleted by Twitter, Trump told his supporters who violently stormed the Capitol on Wednesday that he "loved" them and calling them "very special."
Trump's account will be locked for 12 hours following the removal of three tweets. "If the tweets are not removed, the account will remain locked," the company said.
Twitter also warned that future violations of the Twitter Rules, including its Civic Integrity or Violent Threats policies, will result in permanent suspension of Trump's account.
Facebook also removed Trump's recent video on encouraging the protests and his subsequent post about the election results from Facebook and Instagram.
The company announced that it has "assessed two policy violations against President Trump's Page which will result in a 24-hour feature block, meaning he will lose the ability to post on the platform during that time."
"The violent protests in the Capitol today are a disgrace. We prohibit incitement and calls for violence on our platform. We are actively reviewing and removing any content that breaks these rules," Facebook said.
The measure was taken as Facebook had been searching for and removing content of praise and support of the storming of the U.S. Capitol, according to Guy Rosen, Facebook vice president of integrity, and Monika Bickert, the company's vice president of global policy management.
Facebook also deleted posts calling on people to bring weapons to locations across the United States, including protest sites.
The company said that it was updating the label on posts across its platforms that attempt to delegitimize the election results.
According to Facebook, it has continued to enforce a ban on hate groups including the Proud Boys and many others, and has already removed over 600 militarized social movements from the platform.
Google-owned YouTube has also removed the above-mentioned video by Trump. The company said in a statement that the video violated "policies regarding content that alleges widespread fraud or errors changed the outcome."
In early December 2020, Youtube announced that it would remove content that made false claims about the U.S. election.
