Mexico’s president launches campaign against social media censorship, urges other governments to form a common front

Mexico’s President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador vowed to lead an international effort to combat censorship by social media companies after they blocked or suspended former US President Donald Trump’s accounts, the Associated Press reported. 

Obrador’s administration reached out to other governments on this issue, and France, Germany, the European Union, Africa, Latin America and Southeast Asia have responded to the president’s international campaign. 

Poland’s Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki called for regulations that would govern the use of Facebook, Twitter and Instagram in the European Union. 

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who has previously spoken out against Trump, considers the former US president’s permanent suspension from online platforms “problematic,” CNBC reported. 

The Mexican president said that private companies should not have the right to decide who can speak. 

“What shocks me is that Twitter is the one to close his account. The regulations of the digital world cannot be done by the digital oligarchy,” News week reported, citing French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire.

Trump’s ban on social media has sparked a critical debate on whether social media companies’ violate free speech. Social media outlets like Twitter has been the first to speak out for the permanent ban on their platform.