“As he is now an active candidate for president of the United States, we have restored access to Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.’s, Instagram account,” Andy Stone, a spokesperson for Instagram’s parent company Meta said in a statement. Kennedy, who has a long history of spreading vaccine misinformation, was banned from Instagram in February 2021. A company spokesperson at the time said Instagram had removed his account for “repeatedly sharing debunked claims about the coronavirus or vaccines.
The decision comes as traditional media and social media companies attempt to navigate a 2024 election campaign fraught with accusations of misinformation and censorship. On Friday, YouTube announced it would no longer remove content featuring false claims that the 2020 US presidential election was stolen, reversing a policy instituted more than two years ago amid a wave of misinformation about the election.