Twitter to reverse the ban on political ads on the platform

Elon Musk's Twitter plans to reverse a ban on political ads on the platform after more than two years. As revealed by Twitter Safety, an account affiliated with Twitter, the company will expand permission for political advertising in the coming weeks. Twitter banned political ads in 2019 after facing overall criticism for allowing election misinformation to spread across its services. Other social media platforms like Facebook also restricted political ads for similar reasons.

In a tweet, Twitter said it also plans to reintroduce cause-based advertising to facilitate "public conversation about important issues." The company had restricted ads related to social causes around the same time it banned political ads. At this time, cause-based ad permissions are only relaxed in the US.

In another tweet, Twitter adds, "Moving forward, we will align our advertising policy with that of TV and other media outlets. As with all policy changes, we will first ensure that our approach to reviewing and approving content protects people on Twitter. We'll share more details as this work progresses."

Notably, in 2019 CEO Jack Dorsey said that political ads should be earned, not bought. He added that a political message gains reach when people choose to follow an account or retweet, and paying for reach removes that decision, forcing highly optimized and targeted political messages on people. "We believe that this decision should not be compromised by money," Dorsey said in October 2019.

Twitter's new owner, Elon Musk, has repeatedly said in the past that he wants the platform to be a destination for free speech. Musk has overturned a ban on former US President Donald Trump after a poll. He hopes to increase the company's declining revenue with his latest decision.

As part of cost-cutting measures, Musk has already laid off more than 50 per cent of Twitter's workforce, reducing the number of employees to about 2,500 from 7,500 (as of September 30, 2022). Some fear more layoffs are imminent near the end of the fiscal year.