On Election Day, Facebook wasn't labeling premature victory posts for individual US states, but now it is. Here's why — and the reason is slightly confusing

• Facebook told the Wall Street Journal on Wednesday that it was not flagging posts prematurely declaring victory in individual states for the US presidential election.
• It would only flag posts that applied to the overall election result, Facebook said.
• But later the same day, it said it would start flagging posts prematurely declaring victory in individual states.
• The labels on these posts remind users that votes are still being counted, and that the result in a state has not been projected.
• Facebook told Business Insider Thursday that the change was triggered by Trump declaring a national victory. Before that point, Facebook's rules didn't apply to individual states — but after, they did, the company told Business Insider.

On Wednesday morning, Facebook changed the way it treated premature declarations of victory for individual states.

Facebook told the Wall Street Journal in the early hours of Wednesday that it wouldn't flag candidates, or anyone else, who declared victory in individual states before all the votes are counted. Facebook told the Journal that its rules for premature declarations of victory on its site only applied to the overall result of the presidential election, not individual states.

This came after Gov. Ron DeSantis declared victory for US President Donald Trump in Florida before the state had been called.

But later the same day, Facebook tweeted that it was extending its policy on premature victory claims to "individuals who declare premature victory in individual states or overall."

The reason for the change is slightly confusing. Essentially, Trump's premature claim — 15 minutes after the Journal story was published — that he had won the overall election triggered Facebook to begin placing warnings on early declarations for specific states, the company told Business Insider.

Before Trump declared a national victory, Facebook was not labeling posts about state victories, the company confirmed.

Adam Mosseri, the head of Instagram, which is owned by Facebook, tweeted: "It's critical that people have accurate information about elections results."

—Adam Mosseri (@mosseri) November 4, 2020

Read more: Facebook's ad ban is now in force ahead of Election Day. Democratic operatives call it 'a PR stunt' that won't stop disinformation but could hurt down-ballot candidates.

Now, posts declaring an early victory in individual states are being labeled, reminding users that votes are still being counted and the election result has not been declared.

Facebook also directs users to its Voting Information Center.

Both Twitter and Facebook sprung into action on Wednesday, when Trump claimed at a speech in the White House that he had won the election, despite votes in key states still being counted.

Before Trump made his speech, he had already posted twice on Facebook that he would claim victory.

In line with its policy against early calls of the overall election result, Facebook placed identical information labels next to both posts.

While both Twitter and Facebook responded to Trump's posts, they did so in very different ways, and misinformation experts told Business Insider that, overall, Twitter did a better job.