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YouTube unbans Donald Trump's account

The disgraced former President can upload videos to his YouTube channel once more.

Donovan Erskine

March 17, 2023 9:30 AM

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Following Donald Trump’s incitement of violence at the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021, several social media and online platforms banned the former President. One of these was YouTube, the world’s largest video-sharing platform. After a couple of years, YouTube is undoing this decision. Donald Trump’s YouTube channel has been unbanned, and he is free to begin posting videos again.

YouTube announced the reinstatement of Donald Trump’s YouTube account in a thread of tweets today.

Reading this statement, it’s clear that YouTube wants to have Trump’s account unrestricted as he gears up for a 2024 Presidential campaign. YouTube likely wants to avoid getting itself into hot water by preventing a high-profile candidate from communicating with voters on its platforms. When YouTube originally banned Trump, the 2020 election had already ended, with Joe Biden defeating the standing President.

YouTube isn’t the only platform to walk back its ban on Donald Trump in recent memory. Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram have all let Trump back onto their platform over the past year after banning him in 2021. While Trump has so far kept his vow to ditch Twitter in favor of supporting his own platform, he’ll likely make a return to posting YouTube videos at some point in the future.

The original streak of bans that were brought against Donald Trump were a result of his comments that led to a riot at the Capitol in Washington D.C. We’ll be watching to see if the former President tweaks his online behavior, or if he’ll force the hands of these social media companies once again.

Donovan Erskine

News Editor

Donovan is a young journalist from Maryland, who likes to game. His oldest gaming memory is playing Pajama Sam on his mom's desktop during weekends. Pokémon Emerald, Halo 2, and the original Star Wars Battlefront 2 were some of the most influential titles in awakening his love for video games. After interning for Shacknews throughout college, Donovan graduated from Bowie State University in 2020 with a major in broadcast journalism and joined the team full-time. He is a huge Scream nerd and film fanatic that will talk with you about movies and games all day. You can follow him on twitter @Donimals_