Facebook no doubt thought banning the accounts of prominent alt-right misinformation vectors like Alex Jones, Milo Yiannopoulos, and Laura Loomer would be a win-win. Not only would it allow the company to get rid of some obvious troublemakers, but it would also make Facebook look decisive about misinformation on its platform, a problem it has been widely criticized for ignoring. The plan was simple: send journalists an embargoed release about the ban, and watch all the favorable press roll in. Unfortunately for Facebook, it didn’t work out that way. The bans were reported before the accounts had all been taken down, so it gave Jones and Yiannopoulos and others lots of time to try to foment outrage over the move, and convince their followers to join them on some other platform.
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Source: Facebook’s PR game is showing | Columbia Journalism Review