YouTube is set to reinstate creators previously banned for promoting Covid-19 misinformation and false election-related content, according to a letter sent Tuesday by parent company Alphabet to a Republican lawmaker.
The policy reversal marks a victory for the conservative allies of US President Donald Trump, who have long accused tech platforms and professional fact-checkers of a liberal bias and of using anti-misinformation policies as a pretext for censorship.
“Reflecting the company’s commitment to free expression, YouTube will provide an opportunity for all creators to rejoin the platform if the company terminated their channels for repeated violations of Covid-19 and elections integrity policies that are no longer in effect,” Alphabet’s legal counsel said in the five-page letter to Jim Jordan, the Republican chair of the House Judiciary Committee.
“YouTube values conservative voices on its platform and recognizes that these creators have extensive reach and play an important role in civic discourse.”
The full impact of the policy reversal was yet to be determined, and it was not immediately clear which creators would be reinstated and when.
In recent years, figures such as FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino, White House counterterrorism chief Sebastian Gorka and podcast host Steve Bannon were among those previously banned from the platform, according to US media.
Alphabet accused former president Joe Biden’s administration of pressuring the company to impose the bans.
“Senior Biden Administration officials, including White House officials, conducted repeated and sustained outreach to Alphabet and pressed the company regarding certain user-generated content related to the COVID-19 pandemic that did not violate its policies,” the letter said.
“While the company continued to develop and enforce its policies independently, Biden administration officials continued to press the Company to remove non-violative user-generated content,” it added.
