Donald Trump’s Twitter account, @realDonaldTrump, has been his prime connection with his followers and the rest of the world throughout his tenure in the White House. To understand its importance to him try to imagine his presidency without his use of Twitter. Now that he is about to lose his bully pulpit, he will not have hordes of reporters following his every move so he will have to rely even more on his tweets to remain relevant. Once he leaves office It will be time to significantly reduce the size of his Twitter audience.
Once Trump became president the number of followers of his @realDonaldTrump Twitter account increased sixfold and continued to increase throughout the last four years. For example, during May of this year, when his tweeted attacks of the election process began in earnest, he gained 1.7 million followers. Since then his Twitter account has attracted approximately 400K additional followers to 88.8 million. Trump’s account is the 6th most followed on Twitter. (President Obama occupies first place with 125 million followers.)
How has Trump used this powerful communications platform? He has consistently used Twitter to spread lies and disinformation, attack anyone who dared to disagree with him, push wild conspiracy theories, encourage white nationalist and militia members, and strive to divide the country into warring factions. Perhaps more importantly given his narcissistic personality, he has used that social media tool to feed his massive ego with the constant adoration from his fans that he craves.
Of course, Trump’s most devoted supporters make up a large segment of his Twitter audience, but they aren’t his only followers. Since the Trump administration considers Trump’s tweets as official presidential communication, a large number of visual and print media reporters have been following Trump to be able to report on his latest tweets. In addition, there are probably many people in this country and around the world who are not fans, but follow Trump on Twitter because . . . well it’s hard to not look at a train wreck. I would never follow Trump, but I have to admit that I sometimes have checked his Twitter account online for the same reason.
Now that he has lost the election, consider how Trump would feel if the number of his Twitter followers were to shrink dramatically. Once it became obvious that he would no longer remain in office, the number of followers of Trump’s @realDonaldTrump account has not been growing. In fact, news reports indicated that at least 44,000 people have unfollowed him in the last three weeks. Already Trump is complaining that Twitter is to blame. He told a Fox New business personality, “It’s not right the way they do it. I know exactly what they’re doing. They take people off my account. They make it very hard for people to join.” Imagine how he would react if he lost millions of Twitter followers.
It is time to start treating Trump like the non-entity he will become on January 20, 2021. He will no longer be the most powerful man in the world and what he has to say on Twitter won’t matter more than a hill of beans. So if you currently follow Trump’s @realDonaldTrump Twitter account and don’t require his daily dose of tweets to maintain your sanity in his alternate reality, unfollow him now. Your life will become a calmer place. And while you are at it help make the hashtag #cutyourtrumpconnection go viral on Twitter.
Cajun (Rick Guilbeau) 11/29/2020
I think I understand both the thrust and the common sense of this suggestion. As one who never uses Twitter, and never will, it does not apply to me.
But I wonder whether, if everyone who would challenge Trump’s inane and insane efforts were to disappear, would that make his lies more appealing?