House Judiciary Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) is supporting Facebook’s decision to suspend former President Donald Trump until at least 2023.
“I think Facebook was right. I think that they have an absolute right to ban liars and the president — the former president — is an absolute liar,” Nadler said on Friday.
He continued, “It’s not a question of free speech because free speech is a question of the government limiting free speech and there’s no question about that here. Private companies… can print whatever they want and I think they’re right to not print lies.”
Watch the video below:
Rep. Jerry Nadler: "I think Facebook was right. I think that they have an absolute right to ban liars and the president — the former president — is an absolute liar." https://t.co/rbW0mStg3o pic.twitter.com/EDAHOHz89z
— The Hill (@thehill) June 4, 2021
Facebook announced on Friday it would be suspending Trump for at least two years.
“Given the gravity of the circumstances that led to Mr. Trump’s suspension, we believe his actions constituted a severe violation of our rules which merit the highest penalty available under the new enforcement protocols,” Facebook wrote in a blog post.
The platform recognized “today’s decision will be criticized by many people on opposing sides of the political divide — but our job is to make a decision in as proportionate, fair and transparent a way as possible, in keeping with the instruction given to us by the Oversight Board.”
White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki weighed in on the decision during a press briefing on Friday, as IJR reported.
“As we look at it, we learned a lot from President Trump, the former president, over the last couple of years about his behavior and how he uses these platforms,” she said.
Psaki continued, “It feels pretty unlikely that the zebra’s going to change his stripes over the next two years. We’ll see.”
