Twitter shuts down accounts for attempting to evade Trump ban

A photo illustration shows the suspended Twitter account of U.S. President Donald Trump on a smartphone and a lit window in the White House residence in Washington, U.S., January 8, 2021. REUTERS/Joshua Roberts/Illustration

Twitter Inc suspended several accounts this week that were set up to share statements from a new part of former U.S. President Donald Trump’s website, saying they broke its rules against evading an account ban.

Trump was banned from Twitter, where he had more than 88 million followers, and multiple other social media platforms following the deadly Jan. 6 siege of the U.S. Capitol by his supporters.

On Tuesday, a page was added to Trump’s site, dubbed “From the Desk of Donald J. Trump,” where he posts messages that can be shared by his audience to both Twitter and Facebook.

“As stated in our ban evasion policy, we’ll take enforcement action on accounts whose apparent intent is to replace or promote content affiliated with a suspended account,” a Twitter spokesman said in a statement.

A Trump representative said they had nothing to do with the suspended accounts, which included @DJTDesk, @DJTrumpDesk, @DeskofDJT and @DeskOfTrump1.

Twitter, which has said that its ban on Trump is permanent even if he runs for office again, has said users can share content from the Trump page as long as it does not fall foul of its ban evasion rules.

On Wednesday, Facebook Inc’s oversight board upheld Facebook’s suspension of Trump but said the company should not have made it indefinite. The board gave Facebook six months to decide a proportionate response.

Trump plans to launch his own social media platform, an adviser has said.