Elon Musk assured this Tuesday that, if he manages to gain ownership of Twitter, he will lift the ban on former President Donald Trump to participate in the social network. Trump was vetoed because of his messages of support for the coup plotters who tried to stop Joe Biden’s confirmation at the Capitol on January 6, 2021 as president-elect at the polls.
“Permanent bans should be extremely rare and truly reserved for accounts that are fake, unwanted accounts, or bots. I don’t think it was right to ban Donald Trump,” the Tesla founder said in a video conference call at the Financial Times. ‘ on vehicles. “I think it was a mistake, because it alienated a good part of the country and ultimately didn’t result in Trump having no voice,” he added.
The former president has been absent from Twitter since January of last year, a network in which, with more than 80 million users, he dedicated himself to harassing anyone who did not laugh at him or dared to criticize him. His messages were usually loaded with lies, insults and manipulations. The company argued to veto Trump that he posed “a risk in inciting more violence.”
Since he was left out of this network, Trump has dedicated himself to launching endless daily emails in which he maintains the great lie that the elections were stolen from him, an issue that all the judges, many appointed by him, have denied him. His impact, however, has been reduced compared to the one he had with Twitter, which made him omnipresent at all hours of the day and night. Despite the tension in the United States, his disappearance from the micromessage chain has contributed to somewhat lowering the atmosphere of confrontation.
A few months ago he launched his own network, Truth (truth) Social, which has been marked by continuous malfunctions. When Twitter accepted Musk’s offer for its acquisition for more than 40,000 million euros, the former president declared that he would not accept to return and that he would remain faithful to his own social network. But few believed him. Or nobody.
“I will reverse that permanent ban,” Musk insisted. That ban was upheld in court when Trump filed his claim. “I don’t own Twitter yet, so this isn’t something that’s going to happen right away because I don’t own it yet. What if I don’t get it?” he wondered.
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