Elon Musk re-instates Donald Trump’s Twitter account after public poll

Picture Courtesy: NPR

Former President Donald Trump’s Twitter account appeared to be back online after a slim majority of votes were cast, in a Twitter poll organized by Elon Musk, in favour of reinstating the former US president, who was banned from the social media service after the 6 January 2021 Capitol riot.

Elon Musk tweeted on Saturday, “The people have spoken. Trump will be reinstated.” Trump had appeared less than keen earlier in the day to return to Twitter. “I don’t see any reason for it,” the former president said via video when asked about it by a panel at the Republican Jewish Coalition’s annual leadership meeting.

Donald Trump said he would stick with his new platform Truth Social, the app developed by his Trump Media & Technology Group (TMTG) startup. Twitter took the extraordinary decision to ban Trump after the 6 January attack on the US Capitol, saying his posts were “highly likely to encourage and inspire people to replicate the criminal acts that took place at the US Capitol”.

Elon Musk first said in May he planned to reverse the ban on Trump, and the timing of any return by Trump was also closely watched – and feared – by many of Twitter’s advertisers. He also said Twitter would not reinstate any banned users until there was a “clear process for doing so”. But this week, Musk suddenly reinstated comedian Kathy Griffin, who had been banned for changing her profile name to “Elon Musk” which violated his new rule against impersonation without indicating it was a parody account. There has been no new information about the moderation council or reinstatement process.