YouTube suspends Trump favorite OANN for spreading misinformation

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One America News Network, an ultra-conservative news channel that became a favorite of President Donald Trump during the 2020 election, was suspended from YouTube yesterday.

The network violated the social media giant’s policy about misinformation related to the coronavirus pandemic. OAN will not be able to earn money from other YouTube videos for a period as well.

The channel was suspended after sharing a video that boasted about a “guaranteed cure” for COVID-19.

In a statement about OANN, YouTube said. “Since early in this pandemic, we’ve worked to prevent the spread of harmful misinformation associated with COVID-19. After careful review, we removed a video from OANN and issued a strike on the channel for violating our Covid-19 misinformation policy, which prohibits content that claims there’s a guaranteed cure.”

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The action against OANN is their first official strike, and YouTube has a three-strike policy. A second strike within 90 days would constitute a two-week suspension. A third strike could lead to a permanent ban.

One America News Network garnered increased attention from the president after he became less enamored with Fox News, the first network to pronounce that Democratic victor Joe Biden had won the state of Arizona in the Nov. 3 presidential election. That win virtually sealed the presidency for Biden.

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OANN supported Trump’s wild, baseless theories that the 2020 race had somehow been “stolen” from him, and he has since called OANN a “great alternative” to Fox. The network saw its ratings increase dramatically after Trump supporters moved away from Fox to an even more conservative alternative.

YouTube has said its staffers have removed more than 200,000 videos that featured dangerous or misleading information about the deadly coronavirus, which has killed over a quarter of a million Americans.

Democratic senators are also beseeching the social media site to remove videos that are misleading about the 2020 election.

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