Twitch, the popular video game streaming website owned by Amazon, has temporarily banned Team Trump, the account tied President Donald Trump’s campaign, for violating the company’s policy on hateful conduct. The move follows similar ones by social media platforms like Twitter, which has blocked and flagged a number of the president’s tweets, and Facebook, which recently removed one of the president’s campaign videos.
In a statement provided to Forbes, a representative for Twitch explained that “hateful conduct is not allowed” on the platform and confirmed that the president’s “channel has been issued a temporary suspension from Twitch for comments made on stream,” which is in line with their policies. The statement also confirmed that the “offending content has been removed.”
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That “offending content” included a video of Trump’s 2016 campaign rally that was recently rebroadcast on the platform. During the rally, the president had said that Mexico was not sending the United States “the right people.” In his remarks, Trump called Mexicans rapists and criminals, comments that were primarily condemned at the time. Twitch also pointed to a second video that was recently broadcast on the platform that violated the site’s hateful-conduct policy. The video, from his recent rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, featured the president stating, “Hey, it’s one o’clock in the morning and a very tough, I’ve used the word on occasion, ‘hombre,’ a very tough hombre is breaking into the window of a young woman whose husband is away as a traveling salesman or whatever he may do. And you call 911 and they say, ‘I’m sorry, this number’s no longer working.’ By the way, you have many cases like that, many, many, many. Whether it’s a young woman, an old woman, a young man or an old man and you’re sleeping.”
At this time, it is unclear how long the Team Trump account will be suspended, as Twitch did not provide such information. The president’s campaign had joined the platform in October to widen his 2020 reelection campaign messaging. When he joined, Twitch had said that it did not exempt political or newsworthy content when removing content, according to CNBC. His first broadcast, in October 2019, featured video from a campaign rally in Minneapolis, during which he targeted Rep. Ilhan Omar, Somali refugees, Bruce Springsteen, and others.
Twitch’s decision to suspend the campaign’s account comes just days after the site announced that it would amplify efforts to crack down on harassment. That announcement followed allegations of sexual abuse and harassment from streamers.
