Facebook stated that they have removed a campaign ad by U.S. President Donald Trump and Vice-President Mike Pence that featured an upside-down red triangle, a symbol once used by Nazis to designate political prisoners, communists, and others in concentration camps.
The tech company says that the ads violated “our policy against organized hate.” A Facebook executive who testified at a House intelligence committee hearing on Thursday said the company does not permit symbols of hateful ideology “unless they’re put up with context or condemnation.”
“In a situation where we don’t see either of those, we don’t allow it on the platform, and we remove it. That’s what we saw in this case with this ad, and anywhere that that symbol is used, we would take the same action,” said Nathaniel Gleicher, Facebook’s head of security policy.
The Trump campaign had spent more than $10,000 US on the ads, which began running on Wednesday and targeted men and women of all ages across the United States, though primarily in Texas, California, and Florida.
Trump campaign communications director Tim Murtaugh said the inverted red triangle was a symbol used by Antifa so it was included in an ad about Antifa. He said the symbol is not in the Anti-Defamation League’s database of symbols of hate. The Trump campaign also argued that the symbol is an emoji.
President Donald Trump ad campaigns were taken down by Facebook as they contained symbols of hateful ideology
“We would note that Facebook still has an inverted red triangle emoji in use, which looks exactly the same, so it’s curious that they would target only this ad,” he said, adding that the symbol was not in the Anti-Defamation League’s database of symbols of hate.
A spokesman for the Anti-Defamation League said its database was not one of historical Nazi symbols but of those “commonly used by modern extremists and white supremacists in the United States”.
He also said there had been some Antifa who had used the red triangle, but that it was not a common symbol used by the group.
“Whether aware of the history or meaning, for the Trump campaign to use a symbol, one which is practically identical to that used by the Nazi regime to classify political prisoners in concentration camps, to attack his opponents is offensive and deeply troubling,” Anti-Defamation League CEO Jonathan Greenblatt said in a statement.
It now remains to be seen if the Trump campaign will take Facebook to court and also if the campaign will look to make use of the new Executive order that was signed by President Trump on Social Media.
Also, read:Â Trump Signs Controversial Social Media Executive Order
