Facebook’s decision on Wednesday to keep former President Donald Trump banned from posting on the platform could have significant implications for his political future.
Trump has repeatedly teased a potential presidential run in 2024, saying as recently as Tuesday that his supporters would be “very, very happy” when he makes a “certain announcement” regarding the race.
But mounting a primary bid without access to the Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram pages that drove engagement with millions of supporters during his last two campaigns could prove to cause difficulties for Trump, should he choose to run.
“It’s devastating to the president that he remains off of these platforms that built out his political apparatus,” Bryan Lanza, a former Trump campaign and transition aide, told the Washington Examiner.
TRUMP BAN UPHELD BY FACEBOOK’S INDEPENDENT OVERSIGHT BOARD
Lanza noted that the political complications of remaining blocked would go beyond the limitations on Trump’s ability to spread his message.
“This is going to continue to hurt fundraising. This is going to hurt candidates that he’s endorsed,” Lanza said, adding that Trump will not have the same tools to “get the message out” on behalf of his chosen Republican candidates that he’s had in the past.
A source close to Trump said that while the ban may have an impact on fundraising, the 2024 contest is too far away to make predictions about the role social media will play.
“You don’t know what significant technologies or platforms that may pop up in that time,” the source said. “No one had ever heard of TikTok four years ago.”
TRUMP BLASTS ‘RADICAL LEFT LUNATICS’ IN RESPONSE TO FACEBOOK MAINTAINING BAN
Trump’s 2016 and 2020 campaigns relied heavily on Facebook advertising. The former president has used the social media platform to raise campaign cash as well — an effort that the ban would hurt if kept intact.
The Facebook Oversight Board said on Wednesday that while Trump should remain locked out of his Facebook and Instagram pages, the social media company should come up with a “proportionate” response to the former president’s actions within six months. The board also determined that it is “not appropriate” for Facebook to impose an indefinite suspension on Trump, which is not a punishment the platform typically issues.
Facebook banned Trump over the content the former president posted in the moments before and after his supporters rioted at the Capitol on Jan. 6. Critics have accused Trump of inciting the violence by urging his supporters to fight against what he falsely characterized as a stolen election result.
Twitter also booted Trump from its platform in the wake of the riot, but it did so permanently.
Trump reacted to Facebook’s decision on Wednesday with a statement through his political action committee, Save America PAC.
“What Facebook, Twitter, and Google have done is a total disgrace and an embarrassment to our Country,” Trump said. “Free Speech has been taken away from the President of the United States because the Radical Left Lunatics are afraid of the truth, but the truth will come out anyway, bigger and stronger than ever before.”
Trump said social media companies should “pay a political price,” a sentiment echoed by many of his allies on Capitol Hill on Wednesday.
A day before Facebook upheld its ban, Trump’s team launched a website on which Trump will post videos and statements that his supporters can then share to their own social media pages.
Although Trump has previously threatened to launch a competing social media platform, his aides have previewed no plans to do so.
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Mark Serrano, a Republican strategist who has worked with the Trump campaign, said the former president retains enough of a following to generate interest in his own platform if he chooses to start one.
“Build it or join it, and they will come — the Trump movement is too powerful a force for the censorship of Big Tech to get in the way of freedom,” Serrano said. “I’m confident that in short order, President Trump will be back in stride on social media, connecting with patriotic Americans in all-new ways.”
