Former President Donald Trump responded on Friday to Elon Musk’s buyout of Twitter by touting the TRUTH SOCIAL platform he started after being kicked off Twitter.
In a post on his platform, Trump said, “TRUTH SOCIAL has become somewhat of a phenomena. Last week it had bigger numbers than all other platforms, including TikTok, Twitter, Facebook, and the rest. It also looks and works better to my eye.”
Addressing the news that Musk had closed the deal on his purchase of Twitter, Trump said, “I am very happy that Twitter is now in sane hands, and will no longer be run by Radical Left Lunatics and Maniacs that truly hate our country. Twitter must now work hard to rid itself of all of the bots and fake accounts that have hurt it so badly. It will be much smaller, but better. I LOVE TRUTH!”
Musk has criticized Twitter’s content moderation and permanent user bans under the platforms past ownership and specifically said “it was not correct to ban Donald Trump.”
Twitter locked an account associated with Trump’s campaign in the lead up to the 2020 election and then locked Trump’s personal account on Jan. 6, 2021 until he deleted multiple tweets. One of the tweets was a video message in which Trump called for people who had stormed the U.S. Capitol that day to go home, while also reiterating his dispute of the election results.
On Jan. 8, 2021, Twitter permanently suspended Trump’s account after he tweeted, “The 75,000,000 great American Patriots who voted for me, AMERICA FIRST, and MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN, will have a GIANT VOICE long into the future. They will not be disrespected or treated unfairly in any way, shape or form!!!” and “To all of those who have asked, I will not be going to the Inauguration on January 20th.”
Twitter said that it reviewed how those two Trump tweets were being “interpreted on and off Twitter” and determined they could be interpreted as having glorified acts of violence that took place on Jan. 6. Twitter said Trump’s second tweet could “serve as encouragement to those potentially considering violent acts that the Inauguration would be a ‘safe’ target, as he will not be attending.” Following the reasoning that Trump’s announcement that he would not attend Joe Biden’s presidential inauguration could actually be an invitation for his supporters to engage in violence, Twitter permanently suspended the former president’s account.
In February of last year, then-Twitter Chief Financial Officer Ned Segal said Trump would not be allowed to return to Twitter even if he were to run for office again.
Trump launched his TRUTH SOCIAL platform as an alternative to Twitter. In April, Trump said he would not return to Twitter even if Musk were to take over the platform and undo his account suspension.
