Editor’s note: A previous version of this story was sent to press for the July 24 Sequim Gazette print edition before the Clallam County League of Women Voters Facebook page was restored. — MD

Less than two months from the Primary Election and five months from the General Election in a key presidential election season, Clallam County’s League of Women Voters saw their Facebook page suspended for more than a month.

On Monday, July 22, the page was unblocked after local League members appealed the decision.

“After reviewing your appeal, your Page League of Women Voters of Clallam County has been published. This means it can now be viewed publicly,” Facebook representatives said in an email provided by the League.

In an interview last week, Clallam League chair Bonnie Bless-Boenish said the organization hadn’t posted anything that members suspect would trigger a ban on its page.

“We … put out totally factual information; if we do share anything, it’s usually from a Washington state League or another League that is informational.”

Bless-Boenish said members noticed the page (facebook.com/lwvcla.org) was disabled on or around June 12.

League members appealed the ban, with the response: “Our technology found that your content goes against our standards,” and in a follow-up Facebook added that examples of things that “go against our Community Standards” are “Creating a Page or profile that looks like it belongs to a brand or business” and “Pretending a Page or profile has a business relationship with a business, celebrity or public figure.”

None of those things seemed to apply to the Clallam League’s page, Bless-Boenish said.

“That’s why it’s so confusing,” she said.

The League, a non-partisan group, is active during election season as it sets up and promotes candidate forums, offers resources for voters and helps people get involved in the voting process. The League still uses its website (lwv.org/local-leagues/lwv-clallam-county) for those practices, Bless-Boenish said, but Facebook was a significant driver for those activities.

“It’s really left a pretty big hole on how we get the word out,” she said.

As it turns out, Clallam’s organization wasn’t alone. Several League organizations across the country have seen their pages suspended with various non-specific explanations from the social media company for disabling their pages.

A League organization in Kent, Ohio, saw its Facebook page suspended as well, as detailed in a News 5 Cleveland television story.

“Facebook is a private company; it’s their bat, their ball and their field. They can do pretty much what they want here,” Case Western Law law professor Jonathin Entin told reporters in the News 5 Cleveland story.

“The question really is whether the social media companies which are private companies, should be held to the same legal standards that the government is held to,” Entin said.