Facebook Oversight Board to Rule on Suspended Trump Account

Former President Donald Trump will find out this week whether he gets to return to Facebook. The social network’s quasi-independent Oversight Board is ready to make a ruling on whether the former president’s suspension on the platform should remain permanent. On Monday, the board announced it will hand down its decision Wednesday at approximately 9 a.m. ET (3 p.m. South Africa / 2 p.m. Nigeria).

The Facebook’s Oversight Board, which started operations just before the election and was formed to independently review decisions made on the platform, said a few weeks later in January that a five-person committee would review Trump’s ban and make a decision on whether it should be made permanent within 90 days.

The newly formed group has spent several months weighing the ex-president’s ban from the platform in the wake of the Jan. 6 riots. In January, Trump’s accounts were suspended on the platform and on Facebook-owned Instagram for inciting violence that led to the deadly Jan. 6 Capitol riots. “We believe the risks of allowing the President to continue to use our service during this period are simply too great,” wrote Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg in a post on Jan. 7.

The Oversight Board's decision cannot be overruled by Zuckerberg. 

After years of treating Trump’s inflammatory rhetoric with a light touch, Facebook and Instagram silenced his accounts on Jan. 7, saying at the time he’d be suspended “at least” through the end of his presidency. Facebook set up the oversight panel to rule on thorny issues about content on its platforms, in response to widespread criticism about its inability to respond swiftly and effectively to misinformation, hate speech, and nefarious influence campaigns.

In February, the board confirmed it had received an appeal on behalf of Trump seeking reinstatement of his Facebook and Instagram accounts. Trump’s accounts on YouTube, Snapchat, and Twitter remain suspended. Last week, the Florida state legislature approved a bill preventing social media companies from “de-platforming” politicians such as Trump. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is expected to sign it into law.