Facebook tweaked rules to allow inflammatory post by Trump in 2015

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg tried to removed an inflammatory post by Donald Trump in 2015, who was then Republican candidate for the 2016 US presidential election, but the company allegedly tweaked rules to allow his incendiary posts in the name of political discourse.

According to a report in The Washington Post on Sunday, a video post by Trump in 2015 calling for a ban on Muslim immigrants drew severe criticism by several senior Facebook leaders, including Zuckerberg.

They wanted to take the post down but the company instead created room for such posts to remain in the name of political discourse, according to the report that cited sources and internal documents.

Among the issues debated at Facebook over removing such posts were "PR risks".

In 2016, Zuckerberg wanted to write a post criticizing Trump's call to build a border wall with Mexico but the company warned him "it would look like he was taking sides".

Concerned at advertisers' pulling out from its platform, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg finally said on Saturday that the social network will put warning labels on all posts that break its rules but are deemed newsworthy.

The decision now opens the door to label controversial posts by Trump in the election year.

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