Trump is back on Twitter: Musk unblocks ex-US President's profile - "The people have spoken"

Created: 2022-11-21 05:02

Trump is back on Twitter: Twitter unblocks ex-President Donald Trump's account, as a screenshot of the online platform shows.

© Screenshot Twitter

Donald Trump's Twitter account has been suspended since 2021.

Elon Musk unlocked it again.

A user survey was enough for the new Twitter boss.

San Francisco – The new Twitter boss Elon Musk released the ex-president's profile again after a user vote: Trump's Twitter profile was back on the Internet on Saturday (local time).

However, ex-President Donald Trump had previously reiterated that he did not want to return to Twitter.

The release came four days after Trump announced that he would run again for the US presidency in 2024.

Twitter boss Elon Musk: "The people have spoken.

Trump will be reinstated”

Musk had previously had Twitter users vote in a 24-hour online poll on whether they supported Trump's return.

However, the survey was not representative.

Around 15 million users took part in Musk's 24-hour survey, while the service has more than 230 million daily active users according to the latest available data.

A narrow majority of 51.8 percent voted in favor of Trump's return.

"The people have spoken.

Trump will be reinstated," Musk tweeted on Saturday.

A few minutes after Musk's announcement, Trump's profile was visible on the Internet.

The last entry was from January 8, 2021. 

Trump has been banned from Twitter since January 2021.

On January 6, he expressed sympathy for his supporters who stormed the Capitol - the seat of the US Parliament in Washington.

There, Joe Biden's election victory was to be officially sealed.

Because of the attack, this didn't happen until hours later.

Trump doesn't want to go back to Twitter

However, Trump does not want to return to the platform with the blue bird.

He likes it much better with his self-founded Twitter copy Truth Social.

On Saturday, too, he recommended that his followers take part in the survey, but wrote: "We're not going anywhere.

Truth Social is special!”

Trump reiterated this in a video address at a gathering in Las Vegas on Saturday.

He said of Elon Musk: "I like him (...), he's a character and I like characters." The survey was impressive, "but I have (...) Truth Social." When asked if he would return to Twitter, Trump said he saw no reason to.

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Some of his allies welcomed the activation of his profile.

"Welcome back @realdonaldtrump!" tweeted Republican Paul Gosar on Saturday.

Musk previously announced that the accounts of comedian Kathy Griffin, psychologist Jordan Peterson and conservative parody site Babylon Bee had been "reinstated."

"The Babylon Bee" and Peterson were banned in March and August respectively for violating Twitter's policy for making fun of transgender people.

Griffin was recently banned after taking advantage of the new, relaxed Twitter rules to change her username to "Elon Musk."

"Hardcore ultimatum" on Twitter: Elon Musk gets rid of hundreds of employees in one fell swoop

Musk acquired Twitter for $44 billion at the end of October.

Critics fear that he could drastically limit the fight against the spread of hate speech and fake news on Twitter

Ever since Elon Musk took over the social media platform Twitter, the messenger service has been going through what is probably the biggest upheaval of its existence to date.