UPDATE – Facebook and Instagram ban Trump indefinitely

Jan 7 (Reuters) – Facebook Inc said it would block U.S. President Donald Trump’s accounts “indefinitely” and for at least the next two weeks until the presidential transition is completed.

The decision by Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg comes after Facebook announced on Wednesday it would lock Trump’s account for 24 hours as tech giants scrambled to crack down on his baseless claims about the U.S. presidential election and hundreds of Trump supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol.

“We believe the risks of allowing the President to continue to use our service during this period are simply too great,” Zuckerberg said in a Facebook post on Thursday. He said the block would also apply to Facebook-owned Instagram. (Post: https://bit.ly/2Lc6Xj1)

Twitter Inc and Snap Inc also temporarily locked Trump’s accounts on Wednesday. Civil rights groups including the Anti-Defamation League and Color of Change have called for social media companies to suspend Trump’s accounts permanently.

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Social media companies have been under pressure to police misinformation about the U.S. election on their platforms, including from the president. Trump and his allies for months have amplified baseless claims of election fraud and the president told protesters to go to Capitol Hill, with both Republicans and Democrats saying he was responsible for the resulting violence.

In a video posted to Facebook, Twitter and YouTube on Wednesday, which was later deleted by the platforms, Trump repeated election fraud claims as he told protesters to go home.

“His decision to use his platform to condone rather than condemn the actions of his supporters at the Capitol building has rightly disturbed people in the U.S. and around the world,” said Zuckerberg in his Thursday post.

The Anti-Defamation League praised Facebook’s move, calling it “an obvious first step,” while the NAACP in a statement said the move was a “long overdue” gesture that “rings hollow.”

Facebook has previously been blasted by lawmakers and employees for not acting on inflammatory posts from Trump, including those that have been labeled by Twitter.

(Reporting by Elizabeth Culliford; Additional reporting by Munsif Vengattil in Bengaluru; Editing by Nick Zieminski and Lisa Shumaker)