Snapchat moves against Donald Trump for ‘inciting racial violence’

Snapchat has announced it will stop promoting Donald Trump’s account, with the US President accusing the company of “trying to rig the election”.

Social media giant Snapchat has taken a public stance against the US President Donald Trump, with the app’s parent company announcing on Wednesday it will remove the President’s content from the site’s lead pages.

The move has caused the President to fire back at the platform with his campaign manager saying the social media giant is run by a “radical” and the app is trying to influence the 2020 presidential election.

“We will not amplify voices who incite racial violence and injustice by giving them free promotion on Discover,” Rachel Racusen, a spokeswoman for Snap, which owns the Snapchat app said.

Snap said its decision was made after Mr Trump posted tweets on Saturday threatening to set “vicious dogs” and “ominous weapons” on protesters demonstrating around the US. The tweets did not appear on Mr Trump’s Snapchat account.

Mr Trump posted a Snap to the platform following the announcement, saying “Snapchat is trying to rig the 2020 election, illegally using their corporate funding to promote Joe Biden and suppress President Trump.”

The statement, written by Mr Trump’s campaign manager Brad Parscale, also called Snap’s CEO Evan Spiegel a “radical”.

President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump outside the Saint John Paul II National Shrine on Tuesday. Picture: Patrick Semansky/AP

The Snapchat app is popular among younger adults, teens and kids. Snap said the President’s account will remain intact and his content will be viewable to people who follow him.

Before making the move, Mr Trump’s content would regularly be featured on the Discover page for news and stories, according to the report, featured alongside popular pop culture figures like Kylie Jenner and Kim Kardashian.

The move comes after social media giant Twitter slapped a fact check on two of President's tweets regarding mail in voting ballots and hid one of his tweets after it violated company policy for inciting violence.

Protests have raged across the US for nine straight days sparked by the killing of African-American man George Floyd after a white police officer knelt on his neck for almost nine minutes. The four officers involved have now been charged and taken into custody.

Mr Spiegel also wrote to Snap staff after the decision, saying on Monday: “We will make it clear with our actions that there is no grey area when it comes to racism, violence and injustice.

“We simply cannot promote accounts in America that are linked to people who incite racial violence, whether they do so on or off our platform.”

Mr Trump’s account has continued to post content on the Snap platform.