Facebook and Instagram will restore former President Donald Trump’s accounts about two years after he was banned, parent company Meta announced on Wednesday.
“We will be reinstating Mr. Trump’s Facebook and Instagram accounts in the coming weeks,” Nick Clegg, president of global affairs for Meta, said in a blog post. “However, we are doing so with new guardrails in place to deter repeat offenses.”
Those guardrails entail “heightened penalties for repeat offenses—penalties which will apply to other public figures whose accounts are reinstated from suspensions related to civil unrest under our updated protocol. In the event that Mr. Trump posts further violating content, the content will be removed and he will be suspended for between one month and two years, depending on the severity of the violation,” Clegg wrote.
Trump has not yet issued a public comment about the reinstatement. But Trump’s 2024 campaign officially petitioned Facebook to allow him back on the platform, which he often used for fundraising.
“We believe that the ban on President Trump’s account on Facebook has dramatically distorted and inhibited the public discourse,” Trump’s campaign wrote on Jan. 17 to Meta, according to multiple news reports.
With the lifted suspension, it will allow Trump to run advertisements on both Instagram and Facebook. The former president had amassed tens of millions of followers on both platforms.
“We just do not want—if he is to return to our services—for him to do what he did on January 6, which is to use our services to delegitimize the 2024 election, much as he sought to discredit the 2020 election,” Clegg told Axios.
The accounts, Clegg added, will not be restored right away. Meta’s engineers have to figure out a way to restrict certain posts or advertising capabilities, if it is needed in the future, he said.
“If he now posts further violating content, that content will be removed, of course, and he could be suspended for between one month and two years, depending on the severity of the violation,” he said.
Whether Trump uses the account is another question. After Twitter owner Elon Musk reinstated Trump’s account last year, the former president has said he will remain on Truth Social, his own social media website.
