ATLANTA – Former United States president Donald Trump returned to the social media site X, formerly known as Twitter, with a post on Thursday showing his mugshot from his booking at Fulton County Jail in Georgia earlier in the day.
Trump was booked on more than a dozen felony charges as part of a wide-ranging criminal case stemming from his attempts to overturn his 2020 election defeat in Georgia.
With his post on X appealing for donations, Trump reclaimed direct access to the public on the platform that banned him following the Jan 6, 2021, attack on Congress by his supporters.
On Nov 19, 2022, the San Francisco-based app reversed its position under billionaire Elon Musk, the self-proclaimed “free speech absolutist” who bought Twitter on Oct 2.
Trump, who had more than 88 million followers when Twitter banned him, posted a photo on Thursday of the mugshot and wrote in all caps: “Election interference never surrender!” The post garnered more than 14 million views 50 minutes after going live.
Twitter permanently suspended Trump’s account in January 2021, citing the risk of further incitement of violence following the storming of the US Capitol.
Trump used Twitter and other social media platforms to claim that his defeat in the 2020 election was due to widespread voter fraud and to share other conspiracy theories.
On Nov 15, 2022, Trump launched a bid to regain the White House in 2024.
On Wednesday, he opted out of a Republican primary debate on Fox News for a rival interview on X.
That 46-minute conversation with conservative commentator Tucker Carlson drew nearly 250 million views by Thursday night, according to the site’s statistics.
On Thursday evening, Trump broke from a vow that he would stick exclusively with his new platform Truth Social, the app developed by his Trump Media and Technology Group (TMTG) start-up. Trump had 6.4 million followers on Truth Social as at Thursday.
Truth Social has been Trump’s main source of direct communication with his followers since he began posting on the app regularly in May.
The former president has used Truth Social to promote his allies, criticise his opponents and defend his reputation amid legal scrutiny from state, congressional and federal investigators.
A year ago, TMTG announced a deal to go public by merging with Digital World Acquisition Corp (DWAC), a special-purpose acquisition company (Spac).
The deal – which would infuse TMTG with US$1.3 billion (S$1.76 billion) in cash – is now in doubt amid investigations by the Department of Justice and US Securities and Exchange Commission, which have delayed its closing.
Trump’s company faces a crucial deadline when shareholders of DWAC have until Sept 5 to vote to extend the period of time DWAC has to complete its merger with TMTG. If DWAC does not get the votes, the Spac will liquidate on Sept 8.
Trump sued Twitter in 2021 over his suspension from the platform, arguing that the move violated his right to freedom of speech under the First Amendment of the US Constitution.
A US judge in California dismissed the case, and a federal appeals court in Pasadena, California, is set to take up the dispute on Oct 4.
Attorneys for Trump have said his claims are still viable, and can be ruled on by the appeals court, despite his reinstatement to the platform. REUTERS
