On Wednesday, the Facebook Oversight Board declined to reinstate Donald Trump’s access to his Facebook account. The tech company banned the former president from using the social media platform after appearing to encourage his supporters to storm the U.S. Capitol.
A YouGov poll conducted May 4-6 shows that Americans tend to believe Facebook made the right decision (49% vs 36%) in suspending Trump’s access following the attack on the U.S. Capitol building. But they also now tend to believe his access should now be reinstated, by 46% to 39%.
About three-quarters of Republicans (78%) want Trump allowed back on Facebook and Instagram, compared to 44% of Independents and 27% of Democrats. Just one-quarter of Americans who believe the company made the right decision by indefinitely locking President Trump out of his account (26%) want his account reinstated, compared to 82% of Americans who disagreed with the initial ban.
This poll was still fielding as the Facebook board made its announcement on Wednesday morning that President Trump would continue to be prohibited from posting on its websites. The Board also said that the company’s leadership would need to reassess the decision within six months.
Prior to the announcement, the former president said that he would launch a blog called “From The Desk of Donald J. Trump” that shares paragraph-length missives from the Republican leader. The blog is advertised as a place for Trump “to speak freely and safely.” The de facto head of the GOP has accused social media platforms of being biased against the Republican Party since his time in office.
Two-thirds of Republicans (67%) agree with the former president that social media platforms are generally biased in favor of Democrats, compared to 19% who believe they favor Republicans.
See the toplines and crosstabs from this YouGov Daily poll
Methodology: The YouGov Daily poll consisted of 1,000 completed interviews conducted May 4 - 6, 2021 among U.S. adults citizens ages 18+, using a sample selected from YouGov’s opt-in online panel to match the demographics and other characteristics of the adult U.S. population. Respondents were selected from YouGov’s opt-in Internet panel using sample matching. A random sample (stratified by gender, age, race, education, geographic region, and voter registration) was selected from the 2016 American Community Study. Voter registration was imputed from the November 2016 Current Population Survey Registration and Voting Supplement. The margin of error for the entire sample is 3.4%
Image: Getty
