White House doubles down by tweeting out Trump message that was red-flagged for ‘glorifying violence’ and claims Twitter allows ‘terrorists’ and ‘dictators’ to abuse its platform

The White House official account has tweeted out president Donald Trump‘s post, that was flagged by the social media site yesterday for ‘glorifying violence’ and claimed Twitter allows ‘terrorists’ and ‘dictators’ to abuse its platform.

On Thursday evening, after two days of protests following the death of black man, George Floyd, who died after being restrained by police in Minneapolis, Mr Trump condemned the demonstrators and threatened to call in the National Guard.

The president tweeted: “These THUGS are dishonoring the memory of George Floyd, and I won’t let that happen. Just spoke to Governor Tim Walz and told him that the Military is with him all the way. Any difficulty and we will assume control but, when the looting starts, the shooting starts. Thank you!”

Mr Trump’s post was later hidden and flagged by Twitter for “glorifying violence,” but on Friday morning, the official White House Twitter account tweeted out the president’s post word for word and in quotation marks.

The tweet by the White House account was flagged and hidden by Twitter for “glorifying violence,” but kept on the site, as they argued it was in the “public’s interest.”

The White House claimed later on Friday that Twitter allows ”terrorists, dictators, and foreign propagandists,” to use their site.

Their account posted a screenshot of a tweet from Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader of Iran, where he defended Palestine and said: “Crimes against Palestine trouble any human’s conscience and inspire opposition.”

The White House account captioned the post: “This Tweet violated the Twitter Rules about glorifying violence. However, @Twitter has determined that it will allow terrorists, dictators, and foreign propagandists to abuse its platform.”

After Mr Trump’s original tweet was flagged, the social media site released a statement, explaining why the post was hidden, but allowed to stay on the site.

“We’ve taken action in the interest of preventing others from being inspired to commit violent acts, but have kept the Tweet on Twitter because it is important that the public still be able to see the Tweet given its relevance to ongoing matters of public importance.”

The Trump administration’s deputy chief of staff for communications and director of social media, Dan Scavino Jr, criticised Twitter, in a reply to their tweet that explained the decision.

Mr Scavino Jr tweeted: “Twitter is targeting the President of the United States 24/7, while turning their heads to protest organizers who are planning, plotting, and communicating their next moves daily on this very platform. Twitter is full of s*** - more and more people are beginning to get it.”

Flagging Mr Trump’s tweet was the second intervention on the president’s social media presence by the company, in a matter of days.

On Wednesday Twitter added a fact-check notice to one of his tweets where he claimed that mail-in voting could lead to fraud.

The Trump administration reacted to this fact-checking by releasing an executive order, that could allow federal officials to tackle how social media sites police content on their platforms.

After finding out his tweet about the protests had been flagged by Twitter, Mr Trump claimed that he is being targeted by the social media site.

“Twitter is doing nothing about all of the lies & propaganda being put out by China or the Radical Left Democrat Party,” he wrote.

“They have targeted Republicans, Conservatives & the President of the United States. Section 230 should be revoked by Congress. Until then, it will be regulated!” the president added.

The Independent has reached out to the White House for comment

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