Facebook on Thursday announced that the pro-Trump super PAC, Committee to Defend the President, would be banned from advertising on their platform. This move came in response to multiple verified falsehoods that the group recently shared.

“As a result of the Committee to Defend the President’s repeated sharing of content determined by third-party fact-checkers to be false, they will not be permitted to advertise for a period of time on our platform,” Facebook spokesman Andy Stone said in a statement.

Facebook has not specified how long the PAC’s ban will be in place, and the group did not respond to CNN’s request for comment.

Facebook’s policies on political speech do not preclude politicians themselves from spreading lies and misinformation. Uninterested in making the platform “the arbiters of truth,” CEO Mark Zuckerberg has said that he wants to leave the task of determining what statements are true to the platform’s users.

However, Facebook does have a policy against political action committees from spreading misinformation. As mentioned in its official statement, the company uses a third-party fact-checker to determine the veracity of the claims made by these groups.

“Pages and websites that repeatedly share false news will have some restrictions, including having their distribution reduced,” Facebook’s official policy states. “They may also have their ability to monetize and advertise removed, and their ability to register as a news Page removed.

The Committee to Defend the President has repeatedly faced criticism from the left about misinformation featured in its ads. Earlier in 2020, the group was served a cease and desist from former President Barack Obama’s representatives after the release of a video the used Obama’s words to wrongly imply that Joe Biden supports “plantation politics.” In October, Biden himself wrote a letter to Facebook condemning a different ad from the PAC.

Overall, the group has accumulated nearly one million followers on Facebook and has spent over $300,000 on ads on the platform.

Facebook says it took down more accounts for "coordinated inauthentic behavior," or deceiving users about their identities for political reasons
Facebook says it took down more accounts for "coordinated inauthentic behavior," or deceiving users about their identities for political reasons AFP / Olivier DOULIERY
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