Snapchat is permanently banning Trump's account
Snap, the parent company of the disappearing-messages app, said it made the decision to bar Trump "in the interest of public safety" after violence broke out on Capitol Hill last week.
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Snapchat is the latest company to crack down on Trump.
Snap, the parent company of the disappearing-messages app Snapchat , said Wednesday that it'll permanently ban President Donald Trump's account "in the interest of public safety" after last week's deadly riot on Capitol Hill.
"Last week we announced an indefinite suspension of President Trump's Snapchat account, and have been assessing what long term action is in the best interest of our Snapchat community. In the interest of public safety, and based on his attempts to spread misinformation, hate speech, and incite violence, which are clear violations of our guidelines, we have made the decision to permanently terminate his account," Snap said in a statement.
The tech firm is the latest company to take a tougher stance against Trump, who's been under more scrutiny for pushing baseless claims of voter fraud. Five people died as a result of the riot at the US Capitol, which happened as US lawmakers were certifying Joe Biden as the next US president. Twitter last week permanently banned Trump after he posted tweets that violated the site's rules against glorifying violence. Facebook has locked Trump's account indefinitely. Google-owned YouTube said Tuesday that it was suspending Trump's account for at least one week.
In June, Snapchat stopped promoting Trump's account on a page of curated content called Discover, because the company didn't want to "amplify voices who incite racial violence and injustice" in the aftermath of the police killing of George Floyd. In a statement to The New York Times, Snap said it made the decision after the president tweeted that if racial justice protesters outside the White House breached the fence, they'd be "greeted with the most vicious dogs, and most ominous weapons."
Since then, the president has violated Snapchat's rules against hate speech, incitement of violence and misinformation dozens of times. The content, though, was pulled down minutes after he posted it.
On Wednesday, Trump, who has 2 million followers on Snapchat, was impeached for a second time. As of late Wednesday afternoon, his account displayed video highlights but his entire account will be pulled down, according to Snap. The White House didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.