After more than three years, former US President Donald Trump will reportedly have his Twitch account restored today. The Republican nominee for the presidency for the third straight time–2016, 2020, and now 2024–was indefinitely banned in January 2021 after the Capitol attack.
On X (formerly known as Twitter), reporter Rod Breslau posted that he received the following statement from Twitch: “We reinstated former President Trump’s channel. We believe there is value in hearing from presidential nominees directly, when possible. Trump is now the official Republican nominee for US president.”
Twitch will be reinstating Donald Trump’s account today, Twitch tells me:
“We reinstated former President Trump’s channel. We believe there is value in hearing from Presidential nominees directly, when possible. Trump is now the official Republican nominee for US president.”
— Rod Breslau (@Slasher) July 19, 2024
Before Trump’s account was banned on January 20, 2021, it was disabled January 8 of that year following the January 6 Capitol attack. One of the reasons for this action at the time was Twitch mentioning Trump’s “incendiary rhetoric” as the riot led to multiple deaths and injuries. Before that, in June 2020, Trump also received a temporary suspension for hate speech on the channel.
Going forward, Trump’s reinstated Twitch channel will reportedly be overseen the same as all others, according to Breslau. A Twitch statement shared by Breslau said: “Twitch doesn’t have a ‘public figure policy,’ meaning all channels are equally subject to our guidelines, regardless of whether the channel belongs to a public figure.”
Trump formally accepted the Republican nomination for President at the Republican National Convention this week in Wisconsin. Last weekend, there was an assassination attempt on the former president in Pennsylvania. This led to The Boys Season 4 finale getting a name change and warning before the episode.