Facebook adds disclaimer to Trump post on mail-in voting
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WASHINGTON • Facebook has placed an informational disclaimer on a post from US President Donald Trump claiming mail-in voting would lead to a "corrupt" US presidential election.
The platform's move on Tuesday, without removing the post, follows through on its pledge to step up efforts to fight misinformation, including from world leaders, shifting slightly from its hands-off policy on political speech.
Mr Trump had written on his page that mail-in voting, unless changed by the courts, "will lead to the most CORRUPT ELECTION in our Nation's History!"
He added the hashtag #RIGGEDELECTION.
Facebook added an information tag that read: "Get official voting info on how to vote in the 2020 US Election". It included a link to the government-sponsored USA.gov page.
Facebook has largely held firm to a policy that it will not fact-check political leaders, but it has pledged to take down posts which could lead to violence or mislead people about the voting process.
It recently promised to add labels to posts which would normally be removed for violating platform rules, but which are left online as they are "newsworthy", following the example of Twitter.
The labels have appeared on messages from other elected officials, including US Senator Chuck Schumer, the Democratic leader from New York.
A coalition of activists has pressed Facebook to be more aggressive in removing hateful content and misinformation, including from the President and political leaders. Some 1,000 advertisers have joined a boycott aiming to ramp up pressure on Facebook.
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE, BLOOMBERG
