With the primary season just eight months away, YouTube has declared it’s reversing its policy of taking down videos that claimed any US presidential election in history wasn’t clean.
"Two years, tens of thousands of video removals, and one election cycle later, we recognized it was time to reevaluate the effects of this policy in today's changed landscape," YouTube said in a statement Friday on its official blog.
"With that in mind, and with 2024 campaigns well underway," YouTube says it will "stop removing content" that gives voice to what it calls "false claims that widespread fraud, errors, or glitches occurred in the 2020 and other past US Presidential elections."
However, as YouTube was quick to note in its release, it’s not being framed as a major departure from their previous policies.
The video-sharing company says it’s still "ensuring that when people come to YouTube looking for news and information about elections, they see content from authoritative sources prominently in search and recommendations."
"Following the 2020 US election, we found that videos from authoritative sources like news outlets represented the most viewed and most recommended election videos on YouTube," the company bragged.
Furthermore, ‘"all of our election misinformation policies remain in place," they wrote, "including those that disallow content aiming to mislead voters about the time, place, means, or eligibility requirements for voting; false claims that could materially discourage voting, including those disputing the validity of voting by mail; and content that encourages others to interfere with democratic processes."
The latest move by YouTube comes after major social media firms were publicly condemned for not having done more to combat misinformation and disinformation campaigns in the lead-up to major elections in recent years. Earlier this year, YouTube rescinded its ban against Trump after he'd been initially been cut off over his role in the 2021 Capitol riot.