End of Social Media? Trump to ban Twitter ?
On 26th May Twitter red flagged President Donald Trump’s social media post regarding mail-in ballots as unsubstantiated. The tweet stated, “There is NO WAY (ZERO) that Mail-In Ballots will be anything less than substantially fraudulent.” Soon Twitter tagged Trump’s tweet with a fact-checking warning. The platform said that move was to stop the spread of misinformation. Trump has been very popular in social media. In last 10 days he has gained maximum points among the world leaders.
Donald Trump has over 80 Million followers on Twitter. He has been very much active on Twitter and it is visible that he conveys most of the information using this social media platform. However, red flagging his tweet did not go well with Trump. In month of November, US is heading into Presidential Election. Trump is looking forward for his re-election. Therefore, red flagging of his tweet, Trump was quick to accuse Twitter trying to interfere in US Presidential election.
On Wednesday, 27th May, Trump threatened to regulate social media and ban all the social media platform that does not meet the standards. In his series of tweets Trump said, “Republicans feel that Social Media Platforms totally silence conservatives voices. We will strongly regulate, or close them down, before we can ever allow this to happen. We saw what they attempted to do, and failed, in 2016. We can’t let a more sophisticated version of that happen again. Just like we can’t let large scale Mail-In Ballots take root in our Country. It would be a free for all on cheating, forgery and the theft of Ballots. Whoever cheated the most would win. Likewise, Social Media. Clean up your act, NOW!!!!”
Trump is expected to sign an executive order that will allow US agencies to check and investigate social media companies, including Twitter. Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey responded to Trump’s tweet and said that he is accountable for the actions of the company and instead of punishing the platform, he should be punished.
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg responded in favor of President Trump. In an interview with Fox News, he said Facebook’s policies are different from Twitter on this. “I just believe strongly that Facebook shouldn’t be the arbiter of truth of everything that people say online. In general, private companies probably shouldn’t be especially these platform companies shouldn’t be in the position of doing that.”
President Trump seems to have made up his mind to either ban the social media platform or the enforce stricter norms for the platforms. Coronavirus and then economic collapse has created a huge obstacle for Trump’s re-election to White House. He is in no mood to take any sort of interference of anyone in the upcoming US Presidential election. It will be interesting to see what steps will Trump take against the platform in coming days.