Twitter has verified the account of far-right party Britain First after it was previously banned from the site.
It follows the removal of verified checkmarks from some accounts last week, with footballer Cristiano Ronaldo, cricketer Virat Kohli, former US president Donald Trump, and the official Twitter page for the pope among some of the biggest names to lose them.
The party’s leader Paul Golding, who was jailed in 2018 for hate crimes against Muslims, has also had his account verified.
Accounts labelled as “official organisations” will be able to keep their verified status, according to the new rules.
Britain First, which was not previously verified, has now been awarded a blue tick, which means its tweets are more likely to appear in the newsfeeds of users who do not follow the account.
The accounts of Britain First’s leader and deputy leader Paul Golding and Jayda Fransen were suspended in 2017, as well as the party’s account, under Twitter’s hate speech rules.
Golding was jailed in 2018 for hate crimes, while Fransen attracted global attention when US president Donald Trump retweeted anti-Islam videos she had posted in 2017.
Britain First and its leader rejoined Twitter in October 2022 after Elon Musk took over the company. Fransen has not rejoined the platform.
Within 24 hours of rejoining the platform, the party’s account posted a video of asylum seekers at a hotel in Rotherham and a video “allegedly showing illegal #migrants jumping out of a van in northern France”.
After rejoining Twitter, Mr Golding said: “Britain First was first banned by woke bigots back in 2017 after being retweeted by President Donald Trump. We are glad to be back on the platform as a registered, full UK political party that contests democratic elections.”
The Twitter Verified account tweeted that legacy verified checkmarks would be removed from the site on 20 April and said the main way to get a blue tick would be to pay £8 monthly fee for UK-based users.
Some Twitter users have a grey tick next to their accounts, which highlights that it is verified because “it is a government or multilateral organisation account”. They include Rishi Sunak, Boris Johnson and Liz Truss.
Some users, such as Britain First, will have a gold tick to indicate that “it’s an official organisation on Twitter”, though some media outlets, such as BBC News, CNN, NBC News and Fox News, have had theirs removed.
Twitter owner Elon Musk said he was “personally” paying to keep blue ticks on the accounts of several notable people despite many claiming they would not pay to keep their verified checkmark.
It comes as some companies have quit the platform over concerns it has undermined its credibility.
The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) said it will be “pausing activities on Twitter”.
“Our journalism is impartial and independent. To suggest otherwise is untrue. That is why we are pausing our activities on Twitter,” it tweeted on Monday.
