Mark Zuckerberg told Facebook staff he was ‘disgusted’ by Trump’s comments

Mark Zuckerberg told Facebook employees that he was disgusted by Donald Trump‘s incendiary ‘when the looting starts, the shooting starts’ post about George Floyd protesters last week – while announcing that the social network would not be moderating or deleting it.

The details of his words to Facebook employees emerged a day after workers at the social network walked away from their work-from-home desks on Monday and blasted Zuckerberg for refusing to act on post.  

Audio of the meeting on Friday was obtained by The Verge, and showed the Facebook CEO told staff that: ‘My first reaction … was just disgust. This is not how I think we want our leaders to show up during this time. This is a moment that calls for unity and calmness and empathy for people who are struggling.’

In the audio of the meeting, heard Zuckerberg also criticised Twitter’s response to the Tweet.

He said: ‘If you really believe that a post is going to cause people to go to go do real-world violence, then that’s not the type of thing that I think we should have up even behind a warning.’

Zuckerberg was addressing his employees after Twitter affixed a warning label to a Trump tweet that included the phrase ‘when the looting starts, the shooting starts’. Twitter said it violated rules against glorifying violence but was left up as a public interest exception.

Facebook declined to act on the same message, and Zuckerberg sought to distance his company from the fight between the president and Twitter. 

Mark Zuckerberg (right) told Facebook employees that he was ‘disgusted’ by Donald Trump’s incendiary post about George Floyd protesters last week

Zuckerberg explained in a public statement that the post would not be moderated because Facebook is committed to free expression and he said the public had a right to know that the National Guard could be deployed.   

He said:  ‘I’ve been struggling with how to respond to the President’s tweets and posts all day. Personally, I have a visceral negative reaction to this kind of divisive and inflammatory rhetoric… But I’m responsible for reacting not just in my personal capacity but as the leader of an institution committed to free expression.’

‘I know many people are upset that we’ve left the President’s posts up, but our position is that we should enable as much expression as possible unless it will cause imminent risk of specific harms or dangers spelled out in clear policies. We looked very closely at the post that discussed the protests in Minnesota to evaluate whether it violated our policies.’

‘We decided to leave it up because the National Guard references meant we read it as a warning about state action, and we think people need to know if the government is planning to deploy force.’  

But his additional private words to staff were not enough to them staging a virtual walk out on Monday. 

The employees, who took the day off by logging into Facebook’s systems and requesting time off to support protesters across the country, also added an automated message to their emails saying that they were out of the office in a show of protest.

Staff members have also circulated petitions and threatened to resign, describing the unrest as the most serious challenge to Zuckerberg’s leadership since the company was founded 15 years ago.

Before yesterday’s walkout, Facebook employees were already registering their anger at Facebook’s refusal to act on the President’s post.   

One employee said: ‘All this points to a very high risk of a violent escalation and civil unrest in November and if we fail the test case here, history will not judge us kindly.’

Trump last week took to Facebook and Twitter to speak out about the protests sparked by the killing of George Floyd

The post included the line ‘when the looting starts the shooting starts’ which was used by segregationists in the 1960s 

On Friday Zuckerberg provided a lengthy explanation as to his decision to keep the post live

Zuckerberg held a meeting with his staff shortly after he shared his statement justifying Facebook’s lack of action.

Color of Change President Rashad Robinson (pictured) slammed Zuckerberg for ‘lacking the ability to understand’ why his company’s response to the President’s post was wrong

Facebook has taken action on controversial posts from world leaders in the past.

In March, Facebook took down a post from Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro slamming it as ‘misinformation that could lead to physical harm’.

Bolsonaro shared a video suggesting that hydroxychloroquine could be a treatment for coronavirus.

Zuckerberg was also slammed by civil rights leaders for ‘lacking the ability to understand’ why his company’s response to the President’s post was wrong.

Color of Change President Rashad Robinson told Bloomberg: ‘The problem with my ongoing conversations with Mark, is that I feel like I spent a lot of time, and my colleagues spent a lot of time, explaining to him why these things are a problem, and I think he just very much lacks the ability to understand it.

‘He continues to do things and make decisions that hurt communities and put people in harm’s way and is not accountable for it.’