Twitter disables Trump tweet over copyright complaint

[July 20, 2020]  WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Twitter Inc disabled a campaign-style video that President Donald Trump retweeted on Saturday, citing a copyright complaint.

The video, which included music from the group Linkin Park, disappeared from the president's Twitter feed late Saturday with the notification: "This media has been disabled in response to a report by the copyright owner."

Twitter removed the video, which Trump had retweeted from White House social media director Dan Scavino, after it received a Digital Millennium Copyright Act notice from Machine Shop Entertainment, according to a notice posted on the Lumen Database which collects requests for removal of online materials.

Machine Shop is a management company owned by the rock band Linkin Park, according to its LinkedIn page.

"We respond to valid copyright complaints sent to us by a copyright owner or their authorized representatives," a Twitter representative said in an email statement.

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

Twitter began challenging Trump's tweets in May and has repeatedly clashed with him since. The social media company has several times disabled or commented on tweets by the president because of what it said were copyright complaints or violations of a policy against threatening violence.

President Donald Trump taps the screen on a mobile phone at the approximate time a tweet was released from his Twitter account, during a roundtable discussion on the reopening of small businesses in the State Dining Room at the White House in Washington, U.S., June 18, 2020. REUTERS/Leah Millis

Twitter removed an image the president tweeted on June 30, which included a picture of Trump, because of a complaint from the New York Times, whose photographer had shot the image.

The company also put a tweet from the president behind a warning label in late May, saying that he had violated its rules against "glorifying violence" when he advocated that Minneapolis authorities be tough in responding to protests over the death of George Floyd.

(Reporting by Diane Bartz; Editing by William Mallard)

[© 2020 Thomson Reuters. All rights reserved.]

Copyright 2020 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.  Thompson Reuters is solely responsible for this content.