The Transport Guy: There's a built-in Trump exemption in Twitter's new abuse policy that will allow the president to keep tweeting (TWTR)

Steve Kovach December 18, 2017 at 12:04PM

• Twitter started enforcing new abuse policies Monday by suspending accounts that violate the terms.
• The policies do not apply to government accounts.
• That means even though Trump has technically violated Twitter's abuse policies in the past, he is exempt from the new rules.

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Twitter began enforcing new rules to combat abuse on its platform Monday in a widespread attempt to fix the toxic atmosphere in some of the darker corners of the service.

One of the first casualties of the new policy was Britain First, an anti-Islam group.

If Britain First sounds familiar, that's because it's the same account President Donald Trump retweeted anti-Muslim videos from Britain First a few weeks ago.

So, why did Britain First get the boot from Twitter, while Trump is allowed to continue to tweet under these new rules?

It turns out there's another clause in the new abuse policy that seems written explicitly for Trump's unpredictable Twitter habits:

"This policy does not apply to military or government entities and we will consider exceptions for groups that are currently engaging in (or have engaged in) peaceful resolution," the policy reads.

Even though Trump has apparently violated Twitter's abuse policy on numerous occassions, his status as a "government entity" gives him a pass. Twitter has struggled throughout the year to explain why Trump's account remains active, while others have been suspended or kicked off the platform for far less.

In response to inquiries about Trump's abusive tweets throughout the year, Twitter spokespeople have pointed to various blog posts about abuse, claimed Trump's tweets are newsworthy, or, in the case of the Britain First retweets, offered contradictory responses.

But the one thing Twitter does finally seem to make clear in writing as of Monday: Trump is now officially immune to the company's abuse rules.

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There's a built-in Trump exemption in Twitter's new abuse policy that will allow the president to keep tweeting (TWTR) from Business Insider: Steve Kovach