Nascar star Hailie Deegan's photo with Trump flagged as 'sensitive content' by Twitter and nobody knows why
NASCAR star Hailie Deegan excitedly posted a photo that she took with President Donald Trump and Melania on Sunday, February 16, at Daytona 500. Shortly after she had posted the photo, it was flagged as "sensitive content" by Twitter.
On Saturday, hours after the POTUS announced on Twitter that he will be attending the 2020 Daytona 500 in Florida, the 18-year-old Trump supporter took to social media herself and set a goal for herself. "Today’s goal. Get my helmet signed by Trump," she wrote.
Her tweet was retweeted by Donald Trump Jr., who jokingly wrote, "DM me... I may know someone."
Between making a speech, stopping for an interview and taking an opening quarter of a lap around the track with his full presidential motorcade, the president found the time to make the teenager's dream come true. After signing Deegan's race helmet, he and the first lady even took a photo with her.
Deegan posted the photo on Twitter, with the caption "Goal complete" followed by a green tick sign. However, anyone who visits her social media page is greeted with the message, "The following media includes potentially sensitive content" instead of the thumbnail of the picture. Only when one clicks on the view option on the right side of the message does one get to see the photo.
While many people congratulated her on the photo, others were outraged that Twitter had flagged the post.
"Twitter has marked this picture as "sensitive" because they hate America," one user wrote, while another said, "@twitter continues Throttling, shadowbanning, minimizing in all the obvious ways..."
A third commented: "It is 'sensitive material' cause lib heads are exploded with every moment he is at the #DAYTONA500 @realDonaldTrump is the #boss #snowflake melter."
According to Twitter's policy regarding sensitive content, "All Twitter accounts have media settings to help Twitter understand the type of media you are posting and to help us assist others to find the type of content that they’re interested in. By appropriately marking your media settings, Twitter can identify potentially sensitive content that other users may not wish to see, such as violence or nudity."
It is important to note that Twitter has categorized its flagging criteria under five subheads - graphic violence, adult content, violent sexual conduct, gratuitous gore and hateful imagery - none of which fits into the description of the photo uploaded by Deegan.
On contacted by MEAWW, a Twitter spokesperson said the post was flagged as sensitive due to the media settings of the individual who tweeted it.