Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey has admitted that he should never have allowed then-President Donald Trump to be banned from his social media giant.
The tech titan conceded Tuesday it was the wrong move after Elon Musk, Twitter’s presumptive new owner, said he would reinstate Trump’s account and that Dorsey agreed that there shouldn’t be permanent bans.
“I do agree,” tweeted Dorsey, who was still at the helm when Trump was banned in January 2021 at the end of his presidency.
He said there “are exceptions,” listing sexual exploitation of children, illegal behavior or network manipulation.
“But generally permanent bans are a failure of ours and don’t work,” he said.
Dorsey also said he agreed with another user who tweeted that it’s “short-sighted’ for “a handful of social media companies” to act as “gatekeepers to political discourse.”
“It was a business decision, it shouldn’t have been,” Dorsey wrote of Trump’s ban, saying he believes that “permanent bans of individuals are directionally wrong.”
He also replied to another comment about Trump’s ban that “businesses should not be making these decisions.”
“I’m saying a corporation should not have to make this decision in the first place. [N]ot for something as important as public conversation,” Dorsey wrote.
His argument received widespread support, with many saying he should have realized the error while still at the head of the company.
