Facebook removes Trump campaign ads that contain Nazi symbols

A Trump Facebook ad either demonstrates the insensitive ignorance of the campaign, or lays bare its overtures to white supremacy.

Facebook has removed Trump and Pence campaign ads that contain a symbol associated with Nazism, a red, upside-down triangle. Nazis made their political prisoners, including communists and liberals, wear the symbol on their arms in concentration camps. Today, the Trump campaign is using the symbol to stoke fear about antifa "mobs," and, of course, raise campaign cash.

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After the Washington Post and other outlets reported on the ads and spoke to experts about the symbol's ties to Nazism, Facebook removed the ads.

“We removed these posts and ads for violating our policy against organized hate,” Andy Stone, a Facebook spokesman, told the Post. "Our policy prohibits using a banned hate group’s symbol to identify political prisoners without the context that condemns or discusses the symbol.”

The Trump campaign responded to criticism of the ads by claiming that the upside-down red triangle is a symbol for antifa, and that it's "an emoji." But as NBC reporter Brandy Zadrozny points out, a Google image search for "antifa" does not show a widely understood association between the group and the symbol.

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Despite Facebook's actions Thursday, the ads, which were published on both President Trump's and Vice President Pence's Facebook pages Wednesday, had already garnered 1.5 million views by Thursday. There were reportedly 88 of the offending ads; "88" is also a white supremacist code for "Heil Hitler."

This isn't the first time Trump has used Nazi symbolism in negative ads against political enemies. In 2016, he tweeted an image of Hillary Clinton next to a six-pointed star (the Star of David, which Nazis used to identify Jewish concentration camp prisoners) with the words "most corrupt candidate ever." Trump frequently used the antisemitic dog whistles of tying Clinton to "Wall Street." The campaign's defense of the ad was that it was a "sheriff's star," not a Star of David.

The caption on the anti-antifa red triangle ad reads:

"Dangerous MOBS of far left groups are running through our streets and causing absolute mayhem. They are DESTROYING our cities and rioting - it's absolute madness."

The use of "our streets" and "our cities" and "mobs" stokes fear of the other, characterizing them as invading outsiders, not U.S. citizens.

Even if the campaign's use of the red triangle was, ya know, just accidentally affiliated with Nazism, experts say that it's a worrisome indicator of the campaign's blind spots and decision makers.

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Trump is attempting to get antifa categorized as a terrorist organization. However, experts say it's more of a loose association of organizers, and evidence does not connect the group with the property damage that occurred in the wake of Black Lives Matter Protests.

This move by Facebook stands out from the social network's track record. Facebook has declined to take action on posts by President Trump that glorify violence against protesters and spread voting misinformation. Other platforms, notably Twitter, drew the line against these posts by appending fact checks and warnings to the content. On a call with reporters Wednesday, Facebook's head of communications and policy, Nick Clegg, pointed out that it has taken action against President Trump's posts before, including removing misleading ads about the census. However, Clegg also defended the decision to keep up Trump's voter misinformation posts by employing a form of misinformation—bothsidesism—himself.

Apparently, these days, Facebook does have a line they'll draw for Trump. It's the casual use of Nazi symbols. Good to know.