Twitter slaps warning label on Trump tweets

Published September 17, 2020
This is not the first time Twitter has marked a tweet by US President Donald Trump for questionable accuracy. — AFP/File
This is not the first time Twitter has marked a tweet by US President Donald Trump for questionable accuracy. — AFP/File

Twitter Inc on Thursday placed warning labels on tweets by United States President Donald Trump, saying his post included potentially misleading information regarding the process of mail-in voting.

“Because of the new and unprecedented massive amount of unsolicited ballots which will be sent to “voters”, or wherever, this year, the November 3rd Election result may NEVER BE ACCURATELY DETERMINED, which is what some want. Another election disaster yesterday. Stop Ballot Madness!” Trump had tweeted.

The social media website placed a similar warning label on another tweet by the American president, which was also about mail-in voting.

Underneath the tweets, next to a warning sign, Twitter posted a link saying 'learn how voting in mail is safe and secure'.

In another tweet later, the US president accused Twitter of "making sure that trending on Twitter is anything bad, fake or not, about President Donald Trump".

"So obvious what they are doing. Being studied now!" his tweet read.

This is not the first time Twitter has marked a tweet by Trump for questionable accuracy. In May, Twitter labelled two of Trump's tweets regarding mail-in voting as "unsubstantiated" and accused him of making false claims.

Trump's tweets contended without evidence that mail-in voting would lead to fraud and a "Rigged Election."

Under the tweets, Twitter posted a link that read "Get the facts about mail-in ballots" and which took users to a notice pointing out that the claims are "unsubstantiated", citing reporting by CNN, the Washington Post and other media outlets.

In June, Twitter disabled the US president's campaign tribute video to George Floyd on its platform, citing a copyright complaint.

A month later, another campaign-style video, that was retweeted by Trump, was disabled by Twitter over a similar complaint.

The video, which included music from the group Linkin Park, disappeared from the president’s Twitter feed with the notification: “This media has been disabled in response to a report by the copyright owner.”

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