Twitter Permanently Suspending Trump Draws Support, Calls for Others to Do Same

Making good on a threat Wednesday when protesters turned violent at the Capitol after the president encouraged them to go there during the Electoral College ratification (see here), Twitter said Friday it permanently suspended the account of Donald Trump. The social media platform said this followed the company's "close review" of recent @realDonaldTrump tweets "and the context around them -- specifically how they are being received and interpreted on and off Twitter." The platform cited "the risk of further incitement of violence."

Washington stakeholders immediately welcomed the action, asking other platforms to follow suit. The White House didn't comment.

"After years of the President using Twitter's platform to spread lies, spew hate, and damage the fabric of our democracy, Twitter has finally banned him for perpetual incitement of violence," said House Homeland Security Chairman Bennie Thompson, D-Miss. "His lies on Twitter and other social media platforms have cost lives."

Thompson wants Google's YouTube and Facebook to further ramp-up their actions against Trump's communications on those platforms by "removing him from their platforms permanently." Those companies didn't comment right away.

“While Twitter has permanently suspended President Trump, Facebook and Youtube have implemented half measures that give him future opportunities to exploit their platforms to spread disinformation," wrote Yosef Getachew, director of media and democracy at Common Cause. The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights urges "Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and others to be equally responsible and permanently suspend Trump’s accounts,” said LaShawn Warren, executive vice president-government affairs. Free Press (here) and the National Hispanic Media Coalition (here) said similar.