OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
Former President Donald Trump cast doubt on his return to Twitter, but he sounded more like he would consider it than he has in the past as a poll was close to closing to decide if he should be allowed back on the website.
The former president was speaking to the Republican Jewish Coalition via video conference in Las Vegas this week when the person interviewing him asked about the poll started by Twitter CEO Elon Musk.
“I don’t know if you’ve been following but Twitter is blowing up today. Elon Musk posted a poll that had over thirteen million responses so far asking whether or not you should be reinstated on Twitter. My question to you is what do you think about Elon Musk buying Twitter and if you are reinstated, will we see you back on Twitter again?” a host of the Republican Jewish Coalition said to the former president.
“Well, I like that he bought it. I’ve always liked him. I get along very well during my days as president and got to know him pretty well, but I do like him. I’ve always really … he is a character and I tend to like characters, but he is smart,” the former president said.
“He did put up a poll and I hear it is very overwhelming, very strong, but I have something called … If you look it is Trump owned, but it’s really fantastic, Truth Social and Truth Social is through the roof. It’s doing phenomenally well,” he said.
“The press hates to talk about it, but it’s doing phenomenally well. I think engagement is much better than is with Twitter and it’s taking care of voices that really want to be taken care of, and really smart voices, brilliant voices. Voices that in many cases are both sides. But I can tell you, there’s a lot of voice for Israel lot of power for Israel in Truth Social, so Truth Social has been very, very powerful, very, very strong and I’ll be staying there, but I heard we’re getting a big vote to go back on Twitter. I don’t see it because I don’t see a reason for it,” the former president said.
“They have a lot of problems at Twitter. You see what’s going on, it may make it. It may not make it, but the problems are incredible, the engagements are negative, and you have a lot of bots, and you have a lot of fake accounts, which I think they should get on. But Truth Social has taken the place for a lot of people and I, don’t see them going back onto Twitter,” he said.
That was not the same as when he insisted he would never go back to Twitter in April.
In an interview with Sirius XM’s Americano Media, Trump said he “probably wouldn’t have any interest” in returning to the platform, where he had almost 90 million followers.
“You know, Twitter has become very boring. They’ve gotten rid of a lot of their good voices … a lot of their conservative voices,” Trump said.
It came just before the poll started by Musk ended on Saturday and the former president won.
After more than 15 million votes have been cast, former President Donald Trump has won and will have his account reinstated on Twitter.
Twitter CEO Elon Musk made the announcement on Saturday after Trump won a poll on the app by around 52 percent of the vote.
“Trump will be reinstated. Vox Populi, Vox Dei (which in Latin means the voice of the people (is) the voice of God),” he said.
The people have spoken.
Trump will be reinstated.
Vox Populi, Vox Dei. https://t.co/jmkhFuyfkv
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 20, 2022
As of this writing, the former president’s account is officially back on Twitter and can be found at https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump.
Musk said in May that he would reverse Twitter’s permanent ban on Trump if his $44 billion bid to buy the social media company were successful, as it was.
Musk told the Financial Times that the ban “was morally wrong and flat-out stupid.”
