Twitter added a label to a tweet by President Donald Trump containing unverified claims against the use of mail drop boxes for voting, as it broke the platform’s rules.
In the tweet, Trump said that using mail drop boxes for the elections will allow people to vote multiple times, without citing evidence. He also claimed that the mail drop boxes are not sanitized against COVID-19.
The label applied by Twitter calls out the tweet for violating its civic and election integrity rules. The tweet, however, is still online, as explained by the link leading to the platform’s rules on public-interest exceptions.
Digital Trends was pointed to the official Twitter Safety account for further explanation of the action against Trump’s tweet.
We placed a public interest notice on this Tweet for violating our Civic Integrity Policy for making misleading health claims that could potentially dissuade people from participation in voting. https://t.co/MA6E7mBpkm
— Twitter Safety (@TwitterSafety) August 23, 2020
In a follow-up tweet, Twitter Safety noted its policy that engagements with the labeled tweet will be limited to Retweet with Comment. Users will not be able to Like, Reply, or Retweet it.
Democrats have been promoting mail drop boxes as an alternative to using the U.S. Postal Service, amid the controversy surrounding it. The USPS filed a patent application for a voting system that utilizes blockchain technology for added security, but according to experts, it will take more than that to solve the mail-in voting problem.
Twitter first added a fact-check note to Trump’s tweets in May, when the President claimed that mail-in ballots will be fraudulent and will lead to a rigged election. The tweets were tagged with a link for users to “get the facts about mail-in ballots,” with Trump’s claims described as “unsubstantiated.”
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