Has Meta forced you to follow Donald Trump on Instagram and Facebook?
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Ceaseless memes alongside photos and videos shared both in praise and outrage — from Melania’s Hamburglar hat, to Elon Musk’s concerning salute — have flooded all feeds everywhere since Donald Trump’s inauguration on Monday, January 20. One delayed, and more surprising trend, has followed: furious stories of Instagram users claiming to have been automatically made to follow President Trump, First Lady Melania Trump, as well as Vice President JD Vance across Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta platforms. Cue understandable hysteria.
Some members of the public first expressed their concern when they were notified of the following — others were not notified, and are now vocally directing their followers to check if the same has happened. Some users even claim to have unfollowed the accounts in question long ago only to find them re-followed, and have now blocked the them to prevent auto-following.
The explanation has not squashed concern. It comes after Zuckerberg’s keen interest in sweetening the 47th President. He donated $1 million to Trump’s inauguration fund in December, was present at the inauguration, and made sweeping changes to Meta’s policies earlier this month.
Specifically, these included the replacement of its fact-checking systems which Zuckerberg has said are “too politically biased,” and claiming the move would help in “prioritising speech.” They have been labelled “chilling.”. “It's time to get back to our roots around free expression,” he wrote on a Facebook post. “We're replacing fact checkers with Community Notes, simplifying our policies and focusing on reducing mistakes. Looking forward to this next chapter.”.
