YouTube Suspends Trump’s Channel

YouTube has taken down a new video uploaded on President Donald Trump’s channel for violating the platform’s policies on inciting violence and has banned the channel from posting any new content for the next seven days, the company announced late on Tuesday night, adding to the growing list of social platforms that have shut down or curbed the outgoing president’s online presence due to concerns of potential violence.

YouTube declined to share details of the video that earned Trump the strike, but said that after the one-week timeout, it will revisit the decision. YouTube also removed content from the White House’s channel for violating policy, but the channel itself has not been suspended or been given a strike — just a warning.

Until now, YouTube had been the only remaining major social media platform not to have suspended Trump in some fashion. Facebook has suspended Trump’s account “indefinitely,” while Twitter has banned Trump completely. “After careful review, and in light of concerns about the ongoing potential for violence, we removed new content uploaded to the Donald J. Trump channel and issued a strike for violating our policies for inciting violence,” a YouTube spokesperson said in a statement.

“As a result, in accordance with our long-standing strikes system, the channel is now prevented from uploading new videos or livestreams for a minimum of seven days—which may be extended.” YouTube also said it will be taking the extra step of disabling comments underneath videos on Trump’s channel. Under YouTube’s policies, earning a second strike will result in a two-week suspension and three strikes will result in a permanent ban.

Key Background

Trump has faced severe backlash for his role in inflaming a mob of his supporters with false claims of election fraud, which led to an attack on the Capitol last week. To diminish the risk of further violence, YouTube, Facebook and Twitter first took down a video uploaded by Trump during the Capitol riots where he continued to spew misinformation about the election and told the rioters “we love you, you’re very special.”

Hours after that both Facebook and Twitter took down Trump’s accounts. While Twitter permanently banned the president’s account along with those of his campaign, Facebook and Instagram issued an indefinite ban against him. Other platforms like Amazon-owned live streaming service Twitch and Snapchat have also disabled Trump’s account due to concerns over potential violence.

The Trump campaign’s funding and e-commerce operations have also been hit after being cut off by payments processor Stripe and e-commerce platform Shopify for breaching the platforms’ policies on encouraging violence.