YouTube has agreed to pay $24.5 million to settle a lawsuit with President Donald Trump, according to numerous reports. The president filed the lawsuit over the suspension of his account following the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.
YouTube settles
YouTube, which Alphabet’s Google owns, removed videos and Trump’s account, citing a violation of policies against content that could incite violence.
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His account was reinstated in March 2023.
YouTube will pay $22 million to the nonprofit Trust for the National Mall, which is “dedicated to restoring, preserving and elevating the National Mall, to support the construction of the White House State Ballroom,” according to court documents obtained by CNN.
Another $2.5 million will go to other nonprofits like the American Conservative Union.
“Sometimes even though they might have a case, if they see that the battle is just dragging out for too long, the legal fee doesn’t justify it,” Andrew Ching, a professor at the Johns Hopkins University Carey Business School, told Straight Arrow News. “And in this particular case, I believe YouTube probably sees that President Trump has a lot of levers that he can pull. And so, this might be the simplest way to just move forward.”
This settlement comes as Google faces pressure from the Justice Department to break up its ad businesses. A federal judge ruled the company had created a monopoly in advertising.
A federal court began hearing testimony last week to decide what penalties Google will face.
“[Trump] has a team of people that help him execute policies very effectively, very efficiently, and they’re not afraid of getting to gray areas, even though what they did may not be legal,” Ching said. “It may be challenged at the court, but by the time they are being challenged, it’s too late. The damage has been done. And so you might be better off to be just on good terms with the administration right now.”
Big tech lawsuits
The settlement is the latest in a series between the president and big tech companies.
Meta agreed to pay $25 million, with most of that money going to fund Trump’s presidential library. Meanwhile, X agreed to pay $10 million, with most of that money going directly to the president.
“I think they see that it’s not a 100% slam dunk for them, and I think that’s why they see that probably it’s better to just pay,” Ching said.
Trump’s lawyer, who brought these cases, said his reelection was critical in pushing the companies to settle.
“If he had not been reelected, we would have been in court for 1,000 years,” John P. Coale said to the Wall Street Journal. “It was his reelection that made the difference.”
Those cases nearly didn’t make it to the second Trump presidency. In May 2022, a federal judge dismissed the lawsuit against X, which was then known as Twitter. Trump’s lawyers appealed.
Judges also stayed in the Meta and YouTube suits that same year.
X owner Elon Musk, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai all sat front row at Trump’s inauguration in January.
