Former President Donald J. Trump He returned to Xthe social media platform formerly known as Twitter, announced Thursday evening after a hiatus of more than two years.
Mr. Trump posted a link to his website and a photo of himself in his first new post on X since Twitter banned his account after the US Capitol riots on January 6, 2021. “Never give up!” Read the caption under the mug shot.
Mr Trump returned to X a day after airing an interview he gave with former Fox News host Tucker Carlson, who now airs his talk shows on the service. The interview aired as other Republican presidential candidates took part in their first debate on Wednesday night.
And when Twitter banned Trump, the company said he glorified violence through his posts on the platform, encouraging his supporters to storm the Capitol. But Elon Musk, the self-described “absolute free speech supporter” who bought the social network for $44 billion in October and recently renamed it, said banning Trump was a mistake. He reinstated Mr Trump’s account in November, though it has remained dormant since then.
Mr. Trump has relied on Twitter as a megaphone for years, using the platform to attack opponents, rally supporters and issue policy directives. After the ban, he helped create his own social network, Truth Social.
Mr. Trump owns a financial stake in Truth Social, and is required to make his posts available exclusively on the service for six hours before sharing them on other sites, according to The Verge. filing With the Securities and Exchange Commission. He can immediately post to any site if the messages include political messages, fundraising, or get-the-vote initiatives. Trump has a huge following on Twitter – 86.5 million people, compared to just 6.5 million followers on his Truth Social account.
After Mr. Musk bought the company, Mr. Trump said he would not return to Twitter, adding that he preferred Truth Social. He also mocked Mr. Musk last year when he threatened the Tesla CEO to back out of the Twitter takeover, saying in a letter: Truth is a social function that Mr. Musk was overpaying for the platform and asking it to help with his “many sponsored projects, whether it’s electric cars that don’t drive long enough, self-driving cars that crash, or rocket ships that go nowhere.”