Is the wait finally over? NBC News reported on Wednesday that former President Donald Trump is petitioning Facebook to get his old account up and running again.
Facebook, like Twitter, permanently suspended Trump’s account after the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol. The former president responded by creating his own social media platform, Truth Social.
It is yet to establish the same reach that Trump had on Twitter and Facebook.
In a letter to Meta, Facebook’s parent company, Trump’s campaign argued this is a request to further the First Amendment, NBC News reported.
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“We believe that the ban on President Trump’s account on Facebook has dramatically distorted and inhibited the public discourse,” the letter said.
Trump’s campaign is trying a soft approach, as the letter does not reference any pledge of a lawsuit if Meta refuses the request.
Instead, they request a meeting with the heads of Meta to discuss ending the ban.
NBC News noted that Trump had 34 million followers on Facebook when he was kicked off.
He had another 88 million on Twitter, which under new owner Elon Musk reinstated Trump in November. He has not tweeted so far, and recently told an interviewer that he did not see the need to go back on Twitter, since he owns his own platform.
But, as Trump has shown, he may restart his presence on the bigger platforms if only to spite Democrats.
Some Democrats maintain Trump is too big a risk to allow back on the platform.
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“Trump has continued to post harmful election content on Truth Social that would likely violate Facebook’s policies, and we have every reason to believe he would bring similar conspiratorial rhetoric back to Facebook if given the chance,” left-wing Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff wrote to Meta after the 2022 elections.
“We believe that part of the commitment to election integrity should be ensuring that those who maintain the unfounded, dangerous narrative of the 2020 election are not allowed or encouraged to spread the lie to foster engagement on Facebook.”
Schiff, of course, was an election denier in his own right. He spent most of Trump’s time in office lying about having secret evidence that would reveal Trump had colluded with Russian operatives in 2016 to steal the election from Hillary Clinton.
Three Democratic lawmakers joined Schiff in asking Facebook to keep Trump off.
One of them was Rep. Kathy Castor of Tampa.
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