TikTok Users Report Anti-Trump Content Being Hidden Following Platform's Unbanning
By Esat Dedezade,
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Esat Dedezade is U.K.-based journalist who covers Big Tech for Forbes
TikTok users are reporting difficulties accessing content critical of President Trump on the platform. These reports follow similar recent criticisms raised against Meta over blocked Democrat-related search terms on Instagram, marking the latest developments in a series of content moderation controversies across major social media platforms this week.
Currently, multiple TikTok users have documented that searches for terms critical of Trump produce a "No results found" message when accessed from U.S.-based accounts, while the same searches from international accounts still display the relevant content, International Business Times reports. One user’s X post demonstrating these differences by switching between U.S. and UK VPNs has received over 187,000 likes, with others reporting that attempts to repost content critical of Trump's policies are blocked by connection error messages, despite having no other platform access issues.
These reports come just days after TikTok resumed service following a 12-hour shutdown, which ended after Trump indicated he would issue an executive order (which has since been signed), allowing the platform to continue operating in the United States. In response to these concerns, a TikTok spokesperson told the A.V. Club that the company's policies and algorithms have not changed, attributing current issues to temporary instability as U.S. operations are restored to normal. The spokesperson emphasized that there could be various reasons why posts get flagged during this period of service restoration.