YouTube takes down Infowars again
Infowars briefly returned to YouTube before being removed from the platform Thursday, a spokesperson for the video platform confirmed to The Hill.
“The War Room,” Infowars’ program for afternoon commuters, relaunched its YouTube channel on Wednesday, Vice News first reported.
That move came a day after Youtube CEO Susan Wojcicki invited “offensive” content back onto the site in a letter to creators.
{mosads}“Without an open system, diverse and authentic voices have trouble breaking through,” she wrote in the letter. “I believe preserving an open platform is more important than ever.”
“A commitment to openness is not easy. It sometimes means leaving up content that is outside the mainstream, controversial or even offensive,” she said.
In the first video uploaded to the channel, “War Room” host Owen Shroyer reportedly read a portion of Wojcicki’s letter in a video titled “Breaking! YouTube CEO says ‘Alex Jones’ and ‘Infowars Ban Is Over,’” according to Vice.
Infowars was not directly mentioned in the letter.
The channel was removed Thursday, but not before posting several more videos, Vice reported.
“We’re committed to preserving openness and balancing it with our responsibility to protect our community,” the YouTube spokesperson told The Hill. “This means taking action against channels that continue to violate our policies.”
Infowars, and channels associated with it, was originally kicked off of YouTube last year for “violating YouTube’s community guidelines.”
That decision came amid a push to deplatform InfoWars founder and internet radio host Alex Jones from sites like Facebook, Spotify and Twitter.
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