Shopify Hypocrisy: They Took Trump's Store Down But, Latin Kings, Bloods, Crips, and BLM Have Stores

hey, what's happening guys? what's going on youtube? uh, the purpose of today's video- and this one's gonna be a pretty short one, but the purpose of today's video- is to kind of highlight the hypocrisy of shopify. so i put up a video earlier today that uh, but by my standards, got a quite a bit of engagement and comments. normally my, my- videos don't get too much engagement or comments. uh, about half thumbs up, half thumbs down, a lot of comments, a lot of discussion going on. uh, the video was essentially about how shopify pulled down donald trump's shopify stores and, uh, this is kind of a big change. in the past, shopify payments may kick you off of shopify payments, but shopify uh pretty much let anybody in any stores stay up. uh, there was actually some controversy a number of years back when breitbart had a store up and you know, with the cancel culture and everything going on today, everybody was calling on shopify for them to take down breitbart store and shopify's ceo actually stood up and said: look, you know, i think commerce is a form of expression. it's not really our part to to make moral judgments on who's selling or what people are selling, and as long as what people are doing is legal, their stores are going to remain up. well, shopify uh has kind of deviated from that and they wound up pulling down uh, donald trump's store. now, before we get into this, let me just say i don't really have a dog in this fight. i hate the two-party system. i don't care for republicans or democrats. i would consider myself a libertarian. i don't like government. i think government should stay out of our lives as much as possible. if i had to lean one way- i mean i am fiscally conservative. uh, there are issues i i probably fall on the conservative side for, but i mean i'm also for like legalizing drugs. i think wheat should be legal, gay marriage should be illegal, all that type of stuff. so i would consider myself somewhat of a joe rogan. that you know. i don't follow along party lines. i don't get tribal. um, i kind of i'd like to think that i have my own views. so, uh, by no means am i stiking up for trump here. and really, this isn't about trump. it's not about left first right. uh, it's not republican verse, democrat. it's about calling out [ __ ] and, uh, you know, i i think i have a pretty good track record of that. that's why you don't see me selling drop shipping courses about how to make fifty thousand dollars a week, because i really just don't go for [ __ ]. i, i could have been a millionaire, uh, had i started doing that way back in 2014 or 2015, uh, when, uh, when i started this channel. you know, i try to be intellectually honest. uh, i try to be consistent. i think we all have biases, we all tend to be somewhat hypocritikal, uh, but you know, let's judge everybody by the same merits, let's hold everybody to the same standards, and so, in this video, what i wanted to show you is shopify, and we'll take a look at this. uh, shopify has said that shopify does not tolerate actions that incite violence. based on recent events, we have determined that the actions by president donald j trump violate our acceptable use policy, which prohibits promotion or support of organizations, platforms or people that threaten or condone violence to further a cause. now, uh, some people might say black lives matter. uh, engaged in a lot of violence over the summer. uh, we got a black lives matter shopify store here. a shopify store here, a shopify store here. um, and i get it right, a lot of people are gonna say, well, black lives matter was a lot more of a just movement. or donald trump himself called for people to march on on the house: uh, but black lives matter. even though their events and protests dissolved into fire and riots, it wasn't necessarily the organization doing it. now, i don't necessarily agree with that statement, but i know that some people are going to make that argument. well, how about latin kings? we got shopify selling latin kings flags. uh, how about this one? uh, shopify selling blood gang. uh, blood gang. uh, men's cut t-shirts. uh, we got, uh, let's, you know, let's not discriminate. we can't just have the bloods, we gotta have the crips too. [ __ ] cola, and i know, i think that's. uh, you know, i could probably find a bunch more. and honestly, at the end of the day, i'm, you know, i'm doing this to kind of make a point. i realize, with amazon and ebay, all these platforms, when they have thousands, if not tens, if not even hundreds of thousands of sellers, i realize some things are going to slip through the cracks. these stores i'm showing you right now are kind of small, crappy stores. so, um, you know, if this store rose to huge prominence and huge popularity, maybe shopify would take it down. i i don't know if they would or not. um, but when we tok about you know they're essentially saying trump uh called on people to commit violence. now i think we could. you know i'm not gonna stand up for trump. trump yesterday was a bad look. uh, there's really nothing to condone, there's nothing to say that it was okay. did trump outright call for violence? you know, trump. trump had promised that yesterday was going to be a wild day and a wild protest. uh, you know, we might be able to read something into that. uh, when trump called on people to march to the house, he didn't call on people to commit violence. you know, if we really dig into it like you know, could we assume that something bad might happen with with trump riling people up? you know, okay, i'll, i'll give you guys that. uh, but if we look here back to the blm things, i forget this woman's name, but there needs to be unrest in the streets. uh, kamala harris, the future vice president, says protesters should not let up. nancy pelosi says i don't know why there aren't uprisings all over the country. maybe there will be. if you see anybody from that, this is kind of cut off. if you see anybody from that, i'm guessing like group or something or organization in a restaurant, in a department store, at a gasoline station, get out there and get in their faces, form a crowd and push them back and tell them that they are not welcome here anymore. so i'm guessing the democratik party or certain democratik candidates have shopify stores. are we now going to consider the democratik party a hate group because of these statements which, which seem to promote hate and violence? or how about we got kathy griffin here holding up a decapitated trump head? here we have trump protesters storming the uf capital again. i'm not going to stik up for them. it is kind of funny how they're walking in an organ organized single file line, uh, respecting the velvet ropes, and here, as cars are demolished, fires are burning in the background. people have been raped, people have been put in the hospital. there have been deaths. it was a fiery but mostly peaceful protest after a police shooting. um, you know, i don't know if you guys are kind of seeing the point here, not excusing anything trump did yesterday, but if shopify wants to take down donald trump's store, i think they should maybe also take down any stores that promote the democratik party or any of these democratik candidates, uh, that have called for violence and uprising, and they should probably. you know, the the black lives matter, one will say is debatable. i i do think that, um, they were kind of a violent organization over the summer. i mean, even statements from black lives matter was that like, look, we've been asking for decades for respect and not to be killed and not to be murdered, to be treated fairly, and we're sick of it. it's time for violence. so you know, some people might say that black lives matter. some people might try to make the argument that black lives matter is a more just cause than trump crying about a stolen election. uh, but at the end of the day, who's the person who gets to make that, that moral judgment about what's a just cause and what isn't? but even if we want to get past the black lives matter stores that all still have shopify stores up, i don't think there's any arguing that the latin kings, the bloods or the crypts are are not organizations that use vi.

Facebook, Instagram ban Donald Trump indefinitely after supporters storm U.S. Capitol

mark zuckerberg posting um the dramatik move that they believe that the risks of allowing the president to continue to use the service are too great and they will be blocking the president on facebook and instagram indefinitely and at least for the next two weeks until the peaceful transition of power is complete. now, carl, as you mentioned, this is a dramatik move for facebook because mark zuckerberg has stated repeatedly that he believes that facebook is a very necessary platform for free speech. he is always really sided with with this side of free speech. rather than more regulation, he has called for regulation um to help create guidelines to understand how to limit speech on the platform. but this is really a dramatik move, saying they believe it is simply too dangerous to allow the president to use the platform. and just to be clear, carl, this is an extension of a 24-hour block that facebook had put on the president. that began last night and they're now saying that this will be extended indefinitely. to that point, julia, i just wonder how much of this, given the fact that that we have been having these conversations- i mean to think about the tik sell-off we saw yesterday- in part because of expectations that we're going to see tighter regulations, maybe a revisit a sharper, stronger revision of section 230? uh, with this new administration, i mean, is this: is this zuckerberg and facebook looking to get ahead of what might be inevitably that you know? i don't know if it's as much that, morgan, and more the fact that there's been a lot of critikism of these platforms for enabling the organization of some of the writing that we saw yesterday, and the question of whether or not facebook is just simply not quick enough to take things down and whether or not, even if something is up for even 30 seconds, it can be shared and liked many times in that period. so i think there's this question- you know, not just what they face from capitol hill, this question whether facebook is biased in how it regulates content on the platform, but whether it can be used as a tool for bad and whether they need to be much more stringent in preventing that from happening. and simply, right now, they think the risk is too great for the next next two weeks. it's a very, very bold move by mark zuckerberg and cheryl sandberg. to that point, julian, referencing something tom friedman said earlier on squawk box. i mean, there was a period before the election where facebook was elevating more credible news content into people's news feed and then they apparently stopped doing that. you know, do we have any sense that they're going to revisit that policy and perhaps make it permanent as well? well, look, they have been trying to elevate reputable news, partikularly about coronavirus. they've been elevating, you know, correct news from reputable sources around the election. if you go to instagram right now, they say: here is the election news you need to know. here's what's happening right now on capitol hill. but i think what has shifted is, for many years, zuckerberg said that they believed that people needed to know what the president was saying. they needed to know if he was saying things that were incendiary. and now they're saying: these things are incendiary. we don't want people to be incited to violence because of that. i want to just read you one quote here from mark zuckerberg's comments. um, he said, over the last several years, we have allowed president trump to use our platform consistent with our rules, at times removing content or labeling his posts when they violated our policies. we did this because we believe that the public has a right to the broadest possible access to politikal speech, even controversial speech. but the current context is now fundamentally different, involving use of our platform to incite violent insurrection against a democratikally elected government. that paragraph sums up the shift that facebook has made between allowing this as free speech and now saying it certainly incites violence. shepherd smith here. thanks for watching cnbc on youtube.

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Donald Trump Impeachment (Again) | Capitol Riot | QT Politics

Donald Trump was impeached on Wednesday, January 13th, making him the first president in American history to face impeachment twice. The impeachment resolution introduced just one artikle: incitement of insurrection. While the document cited the president s longstanding refusal to accept the election results, including his phone call with Georgia secretary of state Brad Raffensperger, in which he urged the state official to find enough votes to overturn Georgia s election, this information was essentially background for the central charge. What prompted the impeachment proceedings were the events of January 6th 2021: the storming of the Capitol building following a Trump rally near the white house, in which Trump reaffirmed his false claims about a rigged election and encouraged his supporters to march on the Capitol. But Trump s second impeachment is just one of the penalties he has and may soon face as a result of his actions on that day. In this video I m going to break down a number of others, So let s get into it. What are the consequences? After the storming of the capitol on Wednesday, January 6th, many called on the President to resign, which he has declined to do. Others called for his removal through the 25th amendment. Mike Pence is said to oppose this process, despite the fact that he was a target in the capitol riots. The other process to remove the president is impeachment, but Trump is not facing an early exit, no matter the result. While a Senate conviction can theoretikally remove a president from office, Mitch McConnel has made it clear that Trump s second impeachment trial will not take place until after he is already out. That doesn t mean the impeachment trial is meaningless, however. If convicted, Trump could be barred from ever holding public office again. Congress is working quickly to move forward with the impeachment process. House lawmakers introduced an artikle of impeachment on Monday January 11th. Trump was impeached on Wednesday January 13th, just one week after the storming of the capitol building. While Democratik-controlled House was always likely to impeach, it s unclear whether there will be enough votes in the Senate to convict. Ten Republican House members joined Democrats in voting for impeachment, but no Republican Senator has explicitly claimed they would support conviction at the time of this recording. The Senate trial will proceed after the next congress is seated. So, while the Senate is currently under Republican control, the Democrats will be in the majority when proceedings are under way. This is thanks to the Democratik run off victories of Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff defeating Republican incumbents Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue. Still, the Democratik control of the Senate will be narrow: exactly 50% plus one thanks to the tie-breaking vote of Vice President-elect Kamala Harris. In order to actually convict a president on impeachment charges, a two-thirds majority vote is required. So, even though the Senate will be in Democratik hands, a full third of GOP Senators would have to vote to convict for that to happen. That said, it s not inconceivable. GOP Senate leader Mitch McConnel is said to support the process. Senators Pat Toomey, Ben Sasse and Lisa Mukowski have all made statements that suggest they might consider conviction. Of course, there s pretty good reasons why some GOP Senators might want to convict Trump. He s very likely planning to run in 2024, and very likely to be a top, if not the top, contender for the Republican nomination. An ambitious Senator eyeing a presidential run themselves might see the impeachment process as a way of clearing Trump out of the running. Impeachment alone does not prevent Trump from running, but if convicted in the Senate, he could be disqualified from holding politikal office in the future. Plenty of Republican Senators might want to eliminate Trump from contention for other reasons, simply that they believe he s pushing the party in the wrong direction. Another bad sign for Trump came shortly after the insurrection was over. While more than a dozen Republican senators had claimed they would object to at least one state s election result, a number of them backed down after the riot. It remains unclear whether Trump will be convicted in the Senate or whether that conviction will include a ban on future presidential runs, But there are yet other consequences he s facing right now. A number of top Trump officials, including cabinet members, have resigned from the Trump administration, citing the Capitol Riot as the final straw. Recent departures include Betsy DeVos, Secretary of Education, Elaine Chao, Secretary of Transportation, Stephanie Grisham, Chief of Staff to First Lady Melania Trump, Sarah Matthews, Deputy Press Secretary, Mick Mulvaney, Special Envoy to Northern Ireland and former acting Chief of Staff. Numerous social media platforms have banned Donald Trump or Trump related groups, including Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Twitch, Snapchat, Reddit, Discord, Shopify, Tiktok and Stripe. Even his beloved Twitter account has been removed. Perhaps the biggest consequences Trump will face are still in the offing. The Department of Justike has not ruled out bringing charges against President Trump, who will become a private citizen after leaving office. In a video message shared the day after the Capitol Riot, Trump committed to a peaceful transfer of power, acknowledging that a new administration would be inaugurated on the 20th of January, Although, according to reporting by the succeeding New York Times, Trump later expressed regret about releasing that video, It s unclear if this was regret over the commitment to a smooth transition or other statements uttered in the same clip. Trump also condemned the rioters in strong terms in that video, claiming The demonstrators who infiltrated the Capitol have defiled the seat of American democracy. He also said To those who engaged in the acts of violence and destruction: you do not represent our country and to those who broke the law, you will pay. Unsurprisingly, many Trump voters expressed feelings of betrayal on social media and in far-right chat rooms. Conspiracists on Parler and elsewhere suggested the video was a deep fake, despite the fact that it was originally released through Trump s own account. As Trump continues to retro-actively denounce the violence, perhaps as a ploy to avoid legal consequences, he may sap the faith of his most fervent supporters. Trump s following has long been fiercely loyal, to the point where I don t think it would be entirely unfair to say he has a cult of personality. Trump described their almost irrational loyalty himself in his infamous statement: I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn't lose any voters. But what about the rioters themselves. How far does their loyalty go? Will even they continue to support a president who has condemned them for an act they themselves must believe they did at his behest? Or will they somehow manage to find a way of still supporting a guy who appears to have betrayed them? In truth, I can t really say for sure. When Trump condemns his own supporters, What are the consequences?

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Trump sits down with Ukrainian president | ABC News

George Stephanopoulos, good afternoon. we're back on the air right now with breaking news connected to the impeachment inquiry: new president rubber. you see him there with the president of Ukraine, Vladimir zalenski. of course, they had that phone call in July 25th. actually, let's listen to the president right now very, very strongly. all sorts of corruption and some of the problems they've had over the years- I think it's one of the primary reasons he got elected. his reputations absolutely sterling and it's an honor to be with you and we spoke a couple of times, as you probably remember, and they'd like to hear every single word and we give them every single word and then that's a role. what about today? and I think the press would like to stay in the meeting, but we have lots of witnesses that would like to have it. but the country of our country is doing phenomenally well. we are. we have the best economy we've ever had, we have the best employment numbers that we've ever had and we have now almost 160 million people working, which is more than we've ever had. so we're doing very well in every respect and I have a feeling that your country is going to do fantastikally well and whatever we can do, you think about all the stuff. thank you very much. no predators. thank you very much. it's a great pleasure to me to be here and it's better to be on TV than by phone. yeah, mr president, thank you very much. and I'm not the first time. so they say in New York, right, but I know that you've never been in Ukraine and your predecessor also- how to say it in English? didn't find time. I mean, so can you give me a word that you will come to our great country? well, I'm gonna try. I know a lot of people. I did. I will say this. I know a lot of people from Ukraine. they're great people and I own something called the Miss Universe pageants years ago and I sold it to IMG and when I ran for a president I thought maybe it wouldn't be the greatest thing on the Miss Universe said Miss USA pageants, but it's a great thing and we had a winner from Ukraine and we've really had that. we get to know the country very well in a lot of different ways, but it's a country, I think, with tremendous potential. yes, I know it's because I am from this country and I want to thank you for invitation to Washington. you invited me, but I think I'm sorry. I'm sorry but, but I think you forgot to tell me the date. but I think in the New Year they know before us and I want to thank you - thank you specially, mr president - USA to your government. like I said, that I know many, many people, many faces. it's like the second family after you, my Ukrainian family. we know each other. thank you for your support, especially now when you know, when we have - really - worse in Ukraine, the first one is with corruption. nobody will fight, no, will be winner in this fight, I'm sure, and the priority, my priority, the to stop the war on the bus and to get back our territories: Crimean and bus Vogons. thank you for your support in this case. thank you very much. thank you very much, mr president. if you remember, you lost Crimea during a different administration, not during the trump administration. yes, so you have chance to help us. that's right, I did, but that was during the Obama administration that you lost Crimea and I didn't think it was something that you should have, but that was done a long time ago and, I think, was handled poorly. but it's just one of those things. one of the elements that we discussed is: the United States helps Ukraine, but I think that other countries should help Ukraine much more than they're doing. Germany, France, the European Union nations- they really should help you a lot more and I think maybe together we'll work on that. they have to feel a little bit guilty about it because they don't do what they should be doing. you're very important to the European Union, you're very important strategically, very important that I think they should spend a lot more in helping Ukraine, and they know that also and they actually tell me that, but they don't seem to produce. so I'm sure you'll tok to them and I'll certainly be toking to them. thank you very much, mr president. ah, and you know what now we need? we. I want to tell you that we now load the new country and I'm sorry, but we don't need help. we need support, real support, and we think think's everybody to think all of the European countries did help us, but we also want to have more, more, but I understand. so only together, America and EU, only together we can stop the war. and you know we are ready. we just want to tell that we are. remember that we are the biggest country in Europe, but we want to be the richest one. its roots is in my heart. well, you know, you have great people in Ukraine and you have very talented people, their sense of manufacturing, in terms of some of the things they do and we'll be doing. we're doing trading already, but we should be doing a lot more trading with Ukraine. but you have very talented people. they make great things at the top of the line really, so that's very important. the other thing, because I've heard you actually have, over the last fairly short period of time, you've really made some progress with Russia. I hear a lot of progress has been made, and just keep it going. it'd be nice to end that all disaster. first of all, I want to tell you before the first then relations with Russia. I will prolong one minute. I mean that you have to know, and I want world to know, that now we have the new team, the new Parliament, the new government. so now we voted about 74 laws, new laws which help for our new reforms: land reform, big privatization, that the law about concessions, that we reload the general per security and we launched the service secretary attractions- another option, core. as we came, we did. I will launch the anti-corruption court. you know it began to work on the 5th of September it was, you know it was after five days we had the new town. so we are ready. we want to show that we we just come and if somebody, if you, we we want to help us. so just let's do business cases- we have many investment cases. we're ready- and stop corruption in Ukraine, because that will really make you great. that will make you great personally and it'll also to be so tremendously a nation in terms of what you want to do and where you want to take it. thank you very much it to do that. thank you very much, Joe Biden on fire. I think you read everything, so I think you read text. I am sorry, but I don't want to be involved to democratik often elections, elections of USA. no, you heard that we had, I think, good phone call. it was normal, we spoke about many things and I- so I think- and you already- that nobody pushed it pushed me. yes, you know there's no pressure. what you have to do is see it, what went on with us all? but you know that. but you could ask the question and I appreciate you know- I want him to do whatever he can- that this was not his fault. he wasn't there, he just stood here recently. but whatever he can do in terms of corruption- because the corruption is massive now, when Biden's son walks away with millions of dollars from Ukraine and he knows nothing and they're paying a millions of dollars, that's corruption. when Biden son walks out of China with 1.5 billion dollars in a fund- and the biggest funds in the world can't get money out of China- and he's there for one quick meeting and he flies in on Air Force two, I think that's a horrible thing. I think it's a horrible thing, but I'm going far beyond that. I know the President- and I've read a lot about Ukraine- have done a lot of a lot of countries. he wants to stop corruption. he was elected, I think, number one on the basis of stopping corruption which unfortunately, has played Ukraine and if he could do that, he's doing really the whole world the big favor, I know, and I think he's gonna be successful. mr president, well, he's happy, as Groody, I will tell you. I will tell you this- that Rudy's looking to also find out where the phony which on started. how it started: you had a Russian witch-hunt, that turned out to be two, and

MTP NOW Dec. 15 — Trump Trading Cards, Sen. Whitehouse And Biden's Food Insecurity Initiative

if it's Thursday, a slump in the polls and an eyebrow raising fundraising Ploy. it's been a month of setbacks for the former president and Biden's White House allies. craft a 2024 strategy for the current president, plus crypto, corruption, dark money and the court. how the implosion of FTX has reignited issues tied to anti-corruption campaign Finance laws and what Congress can do to clean it up. and 21 tornadoes in 24 hours. Louisiana in a state of emergency after a deadly tornado outbreak tears through the South, leaving a trail of Destruction behind foreign [Music] for truck Todd. it's been exactly one month since former president Donald Trump announced his 2024 candidacy and voters across the country, across America, are now sending a clear message to him and the Republican party. they want something else. a new CNN poll shows 31 percent of the country now has a favorable opinion of Donald Trump. that's the lowest it's been since March of 2016.. that's before he was president. new polls from both Quinnipiac and the Wall Street Journal show similar Trends, with a 59 unfavorable rating. that's the worst Quinnipiac has seen since 2015 before he was the Republican nominee. now his support is also wavering among Republicans: 70 percent now view him favorably, according to Quinnipiac. now that number may sound high, but it's actually his lowest since March of 2016, and many fewer Republicans- just 38 percent- want to see him actually run, according to the CNN poll. yes, it's still 691 days until the 2024 election, but the former president's politikal liability is something that every Republican in Washington is grappling with right now, after Democrats were able to capitalize on the former president's struggles, making him a pillar of the party's midterm strategy. there's no question does. the Republican party today is dominated, driven and intimidated by Donald Trump and the Maggie Republicans, and that is a threat to this country. this election is not a referendum. it's a choice. it's a choice between two vastly different Visions for America. he has abused his power and put the loyalty to himself before lord of the Constitution, and he's made a big lie an artikle of faith in the Maggie Republican Party, the minority of that party. that strategy worked in the midterms and, according to new reporting from NBC News, Biden's allies are now crafting a 2024 strategy that's focused on the former president, even if his name isn't on the ballot. same goes for Democrats in the Senate, with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer telling NBC News- quote the Maga: influence on the party will not go away very quickly, and today, after teasing his first major announcement since declaring his candidacy, former president Trump announced on social media that he was raising money by selling digital trading cards featuring pictures of himself. a few hours later, his campaign put out a press release on censorship in Silicon Valley. joining me now with the latest from Trump World, NBC's Von Hilliard at the White House, NBC's Mike bemely, and for the latest from Capitol Hill, NBC's sahil Kapoor sovana. of course, I'm going to start with you. Trump teased a major announcement, we got a money grab and a censorship policy. what can you tell us about today in Trump World? right, this is the moment in time where there's only one Republican who has announced the Run for the 2024 presidency, and that is Donald Trump, and so, at face value, when the former president United States says that he's got a big announcement, I think that we justifiably pay attention. of course, that makes the case when, uh, the big announcement that he rolls out are digital- uh uh, digital trading cards that are not even for fundraising purposes for his campaign, but for the likes of himself making money personally. it really makes it difficult. it's old, you know the boy that cried wolf, and so at what point is it not about us paying attention, though, but is it about Republican voters who decide to stop paying attention, because there are other Republicans that are eager to jump into this, and you just laid out those numbers there in first read, which I would encourage everybody to go and look at the polling tabs themselves, because when you see where Donald Trump stands in this Republican party today, it's the most dangerous territory that he's been since first announcing his run back in 2015.. at the same time, this is a a proposition the Republicans are going to have to face. is it going to be just Ron DeSantis that challenges him, or are you going to have a splintered Fields? because back in 2016, right before Iowa, New Hampshire and Nevada, it was Donald Trump who had yet to break 40 percent support among Republican voters, and that is exactly where you see him sitting here right now. I was toking with a, an individual who's familiar with Donald Trump's plans here. this is a, a man who has not held the campaign event since announcing his presidential run a month ago, yamiche, but I am told that at the beginning of 2023, he intends to get on the road but hold smaller, more policy focused events, and we've heard this idea of policy events in the past, and he has a history of diverting very much off of it. but the big question here is: can Donald Trump continue to hold on to this- at least a stable base here- and really make other Republicans like Rhonda send his question whether they want to do this at all? and, Von, you're toking about this idea of whether or not it'll make other Republicans question whether or not they want to jump in Trump's announcement last month it was supposed to so in some way solidify, support, clear the field, but it really hasn't done that, has it? no, it has not done that, and frankly, we should not expect anybody else to jump into the race for several months, even if you tok about Ron DeSantis and Glenn Younkin- both of uh, individuals around. both of these individuals have suggested to me that they are looking to first get through their legislative sessions in the states- Virginia in Florida respectively- and so those legislatures will not be meeting and convening until later on this spring. so this may be Donald Trump's terrain for himself. at the same time, look where his numbers are. I think it was the CNN poll that showed back in January: 50 percent of Republican voters said they wanted him to run again. that number is down to just 38 percent now. so that's a 12 point drop, but you could suggest, is that that actually that significant of a drop for a man who is, you know, potentially facing criminal referral from Capitol Hill or even a doj indictment, somebody who openly has toked about the termination of the US Constitution to reinstate him inside of The White House? I'll let others determine that, but right now, despite all of these uh emotions that Donald Trump has taken over the course of these last month, he's still very much in this ball game and again the only Republican presidential candidate in the field, for now at least, in Vaughn, and you, of course, spent a lot of time with Trump World. what are people close to president Trump, people who maybe have been backing him for a long time? what are they saying about these polls and do they think that the midterms possibly hurt him in a way that will hurt him possibly in the long run? they they consistently tell me to look at the Republican field, uh, that this is going to be a republican electorate that determines who their nominee is, and when you look at some of these numbers here, there is reason to believe that Donald Trump uh can coalesce a great Coalition of Republican support here among voters. still, in that CNN poll that I referenced, eight out of ten Republican voters said that they are either fully supportive of Donald Trump as the nominee or could see themselves voting for him in the general election. and so you know the folks that are around Donald Trump. they say: look until folks start actually voting or these numbers start to crumble. uh, you know any. any suggestion that he is disappearing? uh, you know, everybody should hold on to that, and especially when you

Facebook Extends Ban on Trump Posts ‘Indefinitely’

for the first time ever, twitter, facebook and instagram suspended president trump's twitter accounts yesterday, and now mark zuckerberg is saying in a post that quote: we believe the risks of allowing the president to continue to use our service during this period are simply too great. therefore, we are extending the block we have placed on his facebook and instagram accounts indefinitely and for at least the next two weeks until the peaceful transition of power is complete. here to discuss is social media researcher, the director of the mit initiative on the digital economy and also the author of the hype machine: how social media disrupts our elections, our economy and our health, and how we must adapt. sanana raw live in brooklyn, new york. uh, professor raul, thank you so much for for being here. uh, president trump has been spreading misinformation and fear on his social media accounts for some time now. from your perspective, is this block long overdue? well, i think it is, um, and you know i wrote an artikle in october that predicted that this would happen. and i'm not the only one. scientists and experts have been warning about this for months, if not years, and the reason is because the research shows that the information ecosystem is essential to things like this happening, because that kind of information spreading on social media motivates writers and protesters, it helps coordinate writers and protesters and it provides social proof that other people are also going to engage in this, which legitimizes this type of behavior. we saw the coordination with the, the foiled kidnapping attempt of the governor of michigan. this has been a long time coming. so what is the role that tik companies should, should, actually play here? because there is this, this balance of making sure that the leader of the free world, as he is, uh does have access to their platforms, right? well, as far as i can tell, this is unique because, uh, you know, president trump behaves unlike any other president that we've ever seen, unlike most uh leaders. uh, behave, uh, but his remarks recently were partikularly incendiary. they were not an attempt by a leader to create peace. uh, they were, uh, they were stoking the fans, the, you know the, the fires, if you will, and i think that the, the block by facebook, twitter and instagram uh is legitimate in this case. i do think that typically, you want to err on the side of allowing speech to continue, but this is a case of violence, this is a case of a threat to the democracy, in my opinion, uh, and i do believe that these blocks are essential, but i'm wondering if the damage has already been done here. i mean, obviously the damage has been done. we saw the damage play out yesterday. how does this actually happen in in real time? the message was out and it was out there for hours. i hate to be the bearer of bad news, but we're not finished. yeah, so, as i predicted in october that something like this would happen, uh, i believe what happens next is still critikally important. what happens today, what happens tomorrow, what happens over the next two weeks leading up to the inauguration and even potentially beyond, um, i don't think it's a. it's a case of everything is in the rear view mirror. i think we're at a critikal moment and i think that what we do next is essential. um, and i think that we're- we're not quite out of the woods yet. what role do you think social media played in in the organization around yesterday? i think it's clear that it played a very large role. i think it's. it plays multiple roles. it plays a role in spreading misinformation that distorts the reality of people who are engaged in this kind of violence. it creates motivation. it enables coordination, where people can message each other over this type of media in order to coordinate activities like this. it creates social proof that other people will join. research shows. people who study the riot process have indicated in research that rumors are essential to riots because it motivates it, you know, commits writers to a certain line of action. it stokes fear, which then stokes reactions. uh, it's, it stokes camaraderie through social proof. all of these things contribute to any one person's decisions, uh, to join into something like this, and in my book i detail exactly all of the large-scale research evidence that we have that indicate social media's role in protest movements, uh, whether they're violent or peaceful. so so this is a big problem and- and you lay it out in a really succinct way- but at the same time, it's it's a very difficult and i think perhaps to some it would sound an insurmountable task for the platforms to get this under control. what recommendations would you offer? jack dorsey and mark zuckerberg and sheryl sandberg? i believe that they need to have much more detailed and transparent moderation policies that they follow specifically. what they've been doing recently has been adaptive. in other words, we see a partikular new line of of information or a new tweet, and we're going to make, case by case decisions based on this partikular tweet, that partikular tweet, uh, or facebook post, or instagram post. what they need is: so there's sort of a delay there? well, it's, it's adaptive, it's reactive. i should say, okay. what they need is they need a a, a set of detailed policy. uh, you know, uh, uh you know indications of how they're going to moderate content. they need to be transparent about that and every time there's a debate about free speech versus moderation, they need to point back to that policy and say: we thought about this. it is well reasoned and thought out. this is why it falls under the rubric. i mean, if you remember what the new york post- uh biden, uh, hunter biden emails, right, uh, you know. twitter, yeah, changed its fault. it first, uh, you know, blocked and it allowed. then it changed its policy to adapt to the choices that they've made, and so on. that kind of policy is not sustainable. they need to think it they out in advance. they need to consult experts. they need to make the policies transparent. they need to get, uh you know, comments on those policies that need to enact and adhere to those policies going forward. but what about when it comes to actually making sure that people don't use the platforms to to organize things that are are dangerous, because that that's a a stiky situation. absolutely. i don't think that there's any room for allowing the organization of violence on any one of these platforms. that should be rooted out and banned, blocked people who do that should be uh, banned or blocked, uh, and i think that that is an essential part of maintaining public safety, which is a justifiable reason for content moderation on these platforms. sonata rawl, an mit professor of it management, marketing and data science, also the author of the hype machine, how social media disrupts our elections, our economy and our health, and how we must adapt, joining us on quick take live from brooklyn, professor raul. thank you for your time. the biggest stories the moment they happen, from around the globe: subscribe to bloomberg. quick take now for insight in an instant.