Facebook maintains status quo, continues to block Trump

On the eve of the announcement by the monitoring committee set up by social platform Facebook (Fb) on Wednesday (5) that it has decided to continue blocking former US President Donald Trump’s Fb and Instagram accounts, Trump launched his new communication platform on Tuesday (4), allowing him to communicate directly with his supporters online.

The new platform, called “From the Desk of Donald J. Trump,” is built on top of Trump’s personal website, donaldjtrump.com, where Trump can post posts, pictures and videos, and internet users can share them on Fb and Twitter. Trump can post posts, pictures and videos on it, and netizens can share them to Fb and Twitter, but cannot reply or leave messages.

Trump was accused of inciting supporters to break into Capitol Hill through social media posts on January 6 this year, and was subsequently blocked by Twitter and Fb. When Twitter announced in January that it was permanently removing Trump’s personal account, Trump had already vowed to start a new one. By the end of March, Trump’s senior advisor Jason Miller indicated that Trump would launch his own new social media platform in the next two to three months.