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Both Twitter and Facebook have removed a post shared by President Donald Trump for breaking their rules against spreading coronavirus misinformation.

 temporarily blocked the Trump election campaign account from tweeting until it removed a post with a video clip from a Fox News interview from Wednesday morning, in which the president urged schools to reopen, falsely claiming that children are "almost immune from this disease."

Facebook also removed a post containing the same video from Trump's personal page. Both Facebook and Twitter said the post violated their rules on COVID-19 misinformation.

 tend to get infected with the coronavirus less often and have milder symptoms than adults, kids can still contract and spread it. Some have gotten seriously ill and even died.

"This video includes false claims that a group of people is immune from COVID-19 which is a violation of our policies around harmful COVID misinformation," said Andy Stone, a Facebook spokesperson.

"The @TeamTrump Tweet you referenced is in violation of the Twitter Rules on 

 before they can Tweet again," said Twitter spokesperson Trenton Kennedy.

The Trump campaign removed the tweet and has since been tweeting again.

"The President was stating a fact that children are less susceptible to the coronavirus," said Courtney Parella, a spokesperson for the Trump campaign, in response to the Facebook removal. "Another day, another display of Silicon Valley's flagrant bias against this President, where the rules are only enforced in one direction. Social media companies are not the arbiters of truth."  

That echoed what Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has repeatedly said to critics who want him to crack down more on false claims from politicians: that Facebook does not want to be the "arbiter of truth."

Facebook has taken down content shared by Trump before, but Wednesday's video was the first time it did so because of the coronavirus misinformation policy.

Such removals are rare, because Facebook takes a largely 

 to posts from political figures. That stance sets it apart from Twitter, which has added fact-checking and warning labels to the president's tweets and banned political advertising altogether.

Facebook's position has also generated criticism from civil rights groups, Democratic politicians and even its own 

, who have called on Facebook executives to hold politicians to the same standards as other users.

 of Facebook's policies published last month slammed the company for prioritizing free expression "over all other values."

In recent months, Facebook has removed Trump campaign ads that used a 

 as well as ads that made misleading claims about the 2020 census.

In June, Facebook took down a post shared by Trump containing a doctored video of a 

 following a copyright complaint from one of the children's parents. 

Editor's note: Facebook is among NPR's financial supporters.

Shannon Bond

Author

Both social networks said the president's false claims that children are "almost immune" from COVID-19 violated its policy on coronavirus misinformation.

Twitter, Facebook remove Trump post over false claim about children and COVID-19

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