Former President Donald Trump’s Facebook and Instagram accounts have been officially reinstated from their parent company, Meta.

Breaking Update:

Former President Donald Trump’s Facebook and Instagram accounts have been officially reinstated from their parent company, Meta, following his announcement that he would be running for President of the United States in 2024.

Trump’s Facebook and Instagram were banned from all mainstream social media platforms following the January 6th protests in 2021, forcing Trump to create his own social media platform, Truth Social. While the former President was banned on all mainstream social media platforms for over two full years, now Trump’s accounts have been reinstated throughout the social media world.

This move is seen as a major victory for the former President, who has been pushing hard to restore his presence on social media. With this announcement, we can expect more updates from his official accounts in the near future – though it remains to be seen how exactly Trump will use these accounts moving forward.

Previous Update:

Within the “coming weeks” Meta, formerly known as Facebook, is set to reinstate former President Donald Trump’s Facebook and Instagram accounts.

This news comes after years of fighting the ban with Trump’s legal team and supporters. It is expected that the reinstated accounts will be subject to certain restrictions and monitoring by Facebook for any violations of their terms of service. It remains to be seen how much freedom Donald Trump will have in his use of these platforms, but either way, this news has been long awaited by many of his supporters.

Facebook has officially announced that President Trump’s accounts have been restored, and will be subject to special restrictions, likely allowing him to have the platform and post as he did until COVID-19, however, the boot will most likely come down on Trump again if he were to again post non-CDC approved COVID-19 facts, along with posts about election fraud.

In their statement announcing the return on Donald Trump’s account, Meta commented further on Donald Trump’s posting of information they view as “distasteful or inaccurate” stating:

“We default to letting people speak, even when what they have to say is distasteful or factually wrong. Democracy is messy and people should be able to make their voices heard. We believe it is both necessary and possible to draw a line between content that is harmful and should be removed, and content that, however distasteful or inaccurate, is part of the rough and tumble of life in a free society.”

Meta would go on to conclude their statement, saying:

“We know that any decision we make on this issue will be fiercely criticized. Reasonable people will disagree over whether it is the right decision. But a decision had to be made, so we have tried to make it as best we can in a way that is consistent with our values and the process we established in response to the Oversight Board’s guidance.”

Of course, the move was celebrated by many and criticized by others. Trump supporters showed excitement, as this could help Donald Trump win the Primaries in 2024 by once again reaching a large audience on social media. Others, however, were angered by the move, invoking tired arguments about January 6th.

The move from Meta comes following the decision made by new Twitter CEO Elon Musk on November 18, where he decided to reinstate Donald Trump’s Twitter account, @realDonaldTrump.

In the poll which received 134 million votes, Twitter users decided by a margin of 51.8% to 48.2% to unban former President Donald Trump’s Twitter account.

Donald Trump made a statement on whether or not he’d return to Twitter if his account were to be unbanned:

Original Story:

Donald Trump is reportedly looking to regain control of his Facebook account before the 2024 Presidental election, according to a letter written by Trump’s team to Meta, formerly Facebook, which was uncovered by MSNBC.

Trump lost control of his social media accounts following the Capitol Hill protest on January 6th, 2021. Twitter was expected to permanently ban Trump, however, after Elon Musk purchased the platform in 2022, he made the decision to reinstate Trump’s Twitter account with over 88 million followers. Facebook’s two-year ban is set to come under review, and Trump’s team wrote a letter to Meta requesting that the account is reactivated.

Despite Trump owning Truth Social, a social media platform he created, it appears that Trump still has an interest in posting on to other social media platforms as well before the 2024 presidential election. Without Twitter and Facebook, Trump would of course be at a disadvantage, as he would be the only Presidental candidate without access to mainstream social media platforms. These same platforms helped Trump grow in 2016 and eventually beat Hillary Clinton in the Presidental election. Trump was known to use these social media platforms to his advantage for fundraising and getting his message out to the masses, and he’ll need to do the same thing in 2024.

MSNBC reports:

“We believe that the ban on President Trump’s account on Facebook has dramatically distorted and inhibited the public discourse,” Trump’s campaign wrote in its letter to Meta on Tuesday, according to a copy reviewed by NBC News.

Trump’s campaign didn’t threaten a lawsuit, as some sources close to Trump thought he would. It instead talked about the importance of free speech and petitioned Meta for a “meeting to discuss President Trump’s prompt reinstatement to the platform.”

Trump’s plans to expand his social media footprint also speak to the limits of Truth Social’s reach. Trump has slightly more than 4.8 million followers on the platform, compared to nearly 88 million on Twitter and 34 million on Facebook.

Facebook was crucial to Trump’s success in 2016, when his campaign used computer programming to tailor ads to viewers’ data — called microtargeting — which helped him raise money with small-dollar donors and out-message Democrat Hillary Clinton’s campaign. An internal Facebook report found that Trump ran 5.9 million different versions of ads, compared to 66,000 for Clinton, according to Bloomberg News.

Trump has still yet to Tweet from his newly reinstated Twitter. This could be due to the fact that while he has a Twitter, he still does not have a Facebook account, and he may just be waiting until he’d be able to make a full return to social media rather than inch his way back. This letter to Meta may provide rump and his team with the means to make a full return to social media, then, Trump would reach the largest following he has had since January 6th, 2021, and his 2024 campaign would take a tremendous boost.