Facebook pulls Trump campaign ads for fake census claims

Enlarge / The real Census form will look a lot more like this, and a lot less like a Trump campaign website. (credit: liveslow | Getty Images)

Facebook infamously has a broadly laissez-faire policy for political candidates. If you're running for office, you can lie as much as you want in your paid and unpaid content-with one small catch. Anything that lies about voting or the census, such as sharing fake registration links or deliberately spreading incorrect polling dates, is prohibited. Even if it comes directly from the Trump campaign.

It just turns out that Facebook needs a lot of prodding-in the form of negative media attention-to follow through.

The site Popular Information first reported on the Trump campaign's ads early yesterday. The sponsored posts, which appeared on the accounts of President Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence, were paid for by the Trump Make America Great Again committee, a joint fundraising effort by the Trump campaign and the Republican National Committee.

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