Matt Gaetz: Twitter adds 'glorifying violence' label after Republican calls for Antifa to be 'hunted down'

The news follows protests across the US after the death of George Floyd

Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images (Credit: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

Twitter has applied the same label it placed over Donald Trump’s tweet about the Minnesota protestors on another Republican politician's tweet.

Representative Matt Gaetz tweeted “Now that we clearly see Antifa as terrorists, can we hunt them down like we do in the Middle East?”

Twitter deemed that tweet was “glorying violence” and placed it behind a label stating such.

Users need to click a “view” button in order to see Mr Gaetz original tweet, which remains published on the platform because it “may be in the public’s interest for the Tweet to remain accessible”, Twitter says.

Likes, retweets, and comments have all been disabled for the tweet. Users can still quote-tweet Mr Gaetz statement, sharing it into their own timelines, and provide their own comment.

“Antifa” means “anti-fascists”, a definition that has been used by various left-wing groups.

Mr Trump has recently said that the United States will designate “antifa” is a terrorist organisation.

The tweet comes after Donald Trump received the same warning over a tweet posted about those involved in the protests against police brutality and racial inequality that followed the death of George Floyd.

In the post, Mr Trump suggested that protestors could be shot and referred to them as "THUGS".

“These THUGS are dishonoring the memory of George Floyd, and I won’t let that happen. Just spoke to Governor Tim Walz and told him that the Military is with him all the way. Any difficulty and we will assume control but, when the looting starts, the shooting starts. Thank you!” , Mr Trump had previously tweeted.

Twitter determined such a tweet was “glorifying violence” and placed it under a label. “When the looting starts, the shooting starts“ was a phrase used by Miami's police chief amid racial violence there in 1967.

Trump claimed he did not know where he heard the phrase, or of its context, but said “it’s accurate”.

The official White House account, managed by the Trump administration but funded by US taxpayers, unlike Mr Trump's personal account, also tweeted the message. It had the same label applied to it.

Twitter also took action against a previous tweet from Mr Trump, who made false statements about mail-in voting and voter fraud. Twitter did not hide these tweets, but instead placed a blue link to articles debunking the statement underneath the original tweet.

As a result, Mr Trump has claimed that social media companies have “unchecked power” and are not abiding by the First Amendment. The First Amendment does not apply to private companies, only government bodies or private channels used by government bodies, such as the official White House Twitter account.

Nevertheless, Mr Trump has signed an executive order with the aims to roll back Section 230, a piece of American legislation that protects social media companies from being liable for content posted by their users on their platforms. This regulation also protects all websites, independent of political ideology or size, from the being legally responsible for comments on their pages.

Not all social media companies took the same decision as Twitter. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said the company should not be the “arbiter of truth” and left Mr Trump’s message, which the president also posted on his Facebook page, published – to the frustration of users and employees.