Trump compares YouTube pulling his NELK boys interview to Russia censoring war

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Former president Donald Trump on Friday reacted to YouTube’s decision to take down a podcast episode featuring him lying about the 2020 election by claiming the move was akin to the wholesale censorship imposed by the Russian government.

Earlier this week, Mr Trump appeared on an episode of Full Send, a popular podcast from the Canadian media company NELK.

Over the course of his appearance, the twice-impeached ex-president made number of outrageous statements, including a claim that Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine is the fault of former president Barack Obama.

He also suggested that Germany’s history as an aggressor in the First and Second World Wars indicates that the world could be in grave danger from Germany’s decision to increase defence spending as a result of Russian aggression.

But what drew the ire of YouTube’s content moderators was a series of false statements Mr Trump made regarding the 2020 election, including a claim that “incompetent people” were now “heading up” the United States “through a fraudulent election”.

On Thursday, one of the Full Send hosts, Kyle Forgeard, tweeted a screen shot from YouTube showing that the episode had been removed for violating the site’s “misinformation policy,” which prohibits “content that advances false claims that widespread fraud, errors, or glitches changed the outcome of select past national elections, after final election results are officially certified”.

In a statement, Mr Trump claimed YouTube’s decision was a harbinger of more totalitarian censorship that will be imposed by the government, and compared it to recently-passed Russian laws which call for up to 15 years in jail for journalists — or anyone else — who refer to the invasion of Ukraine as anything other than a “special military operation,” report bad news about the invasion, or criticise the decision to invade.

“In Russia, the people are not allowed to know that they’re fighting a war with Ukraine, that’s where our media is going, and that’s where our Country is going because it quickly follows—just study history,” he said.

He later added that the United States is currently “going to hell”.