Facebook to take down pro-Trump posts like 'Stop the steal' ahead of Biden's inauguration

Ahead of US President-elect Joe Biden's formal inauguration, Facebook has announced that it would remove all posts from its platform containing the phrase 'stop the steal', which is being used by the supporters of outgoing US President Donald Trump to allege election fraud.

Trump and his supporters have repeatedly argued that there was massive voter fraud during the November 3 elections which resulted in Biden's victory. While the allegations are unsubstantiated, his supporters have been using this phrase on social media to organise themselves and often hold protests.

"We are now removing content containing the phrase 'stop the steal' under our Coordinating Harm policy from Facebook and Instagram. We removed the original 'Stop the Steal' group in November and have continued to remove pages, groups, and events that violate any of our policies, including calls for violence," Guy Rosen, vice president, integrity, and Monika Bickert, VP, global policy management, Facebook said in a blog post on Monday.

'We've been allowing robust conversations related to the election outcome and that will continue,' they said.

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Facebook said the additional step is being taken in the lead up to the inauguration, in order to curb attempts to organise protests that can lead to violence like that on the Capitol. 

"It may take some time to scale up our enforcement of this new step but we have already removed a significant number of posts. We're taking additional steps and using the same teams and technologies we used during the general election to stop misinformation and content that could incite further violence during these next few weeks," the officials said.

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Politics-related posts banned in US

In addition to the indefinite suspension of Trump's Facebook account, the social media giant has also banned all ads in America, related to politics or elections. "This means that we aren't allowing any ads from politicians, including President Trump," they said.

"Our Voting Information Center will stay active on Facebook and Instagram through the inauguration so it can continue to help people find reliable information and updates about the electoral process," Facebook said.

During inauguration week, Facebook said it would add a news digest to Facebook News as a curated section for people to find reliable news about the inauguration. This will include a live video of the inauguration at the US Capitol on January 20. 

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