Twitter Says It Will Reverse The Ban On Political Ads

Twitter Inc will lift its restriction on political advertisements in 2019, according to Reuters, citing Twitter’s head of trust and safety, as the Elon Musk-owned firm tries to increase revenue.

The social media platform said on Tuesday that it will relax its advertising regulations for “cause-based advertisements” in the United States and harmonise its advertising practices with those of television and other media outlets. The announcement was made through its Twitter Safety account.

The shift would put Twitter’s policy closer to those of Meta Platform’s Facebook and Alphabet Inc’s YouTube, both of which allow political advertising, though the Chinese video app TikTok continues to prohibit it.

“We believe that cause-based advertising may help to stimulate a public conversation about important issues,” the social media business said in a tweet.

Advertisements that educate or increase awareness of problems like as voter registration, climate change, or government programmes such as the Census will be permitted on Twitter, according to Ella Irwin, Twitter’s head of trust and safety, in an email to Reuters.

Political advertising accounted for less than $3 million of total spending in the 2018 US midterm elections, accounting for a fraction of Twitter’s overall earnings.

Twitter prohibited political adverts in 2019 after receiving strong criticism for allowing election disinformation to propagate. It also banned ads for social causes.

“We believe political message reach should be earned, not bought,” Twitter’s then-CEO Jack Dorsey said in announcing the move.

Since Musk took over Twitter in late October, corporate advertisers have fled as a result of the Tesla CEO firing thousands of workers. Trying to undo Donald Trump’s permanent suspension. Rushing a paid verification feature that led to scammers posing as publicly traded companies on the social media platform.

Musk defended his drastic cost-cutting tactics last month, claiming that Twitter will have a “negative cash flow” of $3 billion next year.