Facebook lifts curbs on Donald Trump, giving him equal footing with Biden

Facebook has lifted restrictions imposed on Donald Trump after the Jan 6 attack on the Capitol, placing the former president on an equal footing on the platform with President Joe Biden just days before the Republican National Convention.

The social media giant had initially banned the former president from using its platforms in 2021 after his supporters stormed the Capitol. Meta, Facebook's parent company, lifted that ban last year but announced Trump would be subject to guardrails such as "heightened suspension penalties if posts violated its standards.

Now, the company has removed those restrictions, reasoning that while they were put in place following the extreme and extraordinary circumstances of the Capitol attack, Trump had not done anything to run afoul of them.

In assessing our responsibility to allow political expression, we believe that the American people should be able to hear from the nominees for President on the same basis, Nick Clegg, Meta's president of global ..