Donald Trump is a Twitter addict, and he’ll never break the habit. Even Kellyanne Conway admitted that she couldn’t “take away a grown man’s Twitter” account. Even after January 20, he’ll bash SNL every week, and he’ll beef with foreign leaders while slamming U.S. intelligence and complaining about the “worst” photos of himself. It’s now the American way.
Trump’s also providing hints of how he’ll continue his rage storm. He told The Sunday Times — in an article titled “Brexit Will Be A Great Thing” (naturally, he still feels this way) — Trump vastly exaggerates his number of Twitter account followers (he has 20 million but states a number that’s over twice as much). He also specifies that he’ll use the ‘@RealDonaldTrump’ account for presidential tweets and explains his reasoning:
“@realDonaldTrump I think, I’ll keep it … so I’ve got 46 million people right now — that’s a lot, that’s really a lot — but 46 million — including Facebook, Twitter and ya know, Instagram, so when you think that you’re 46 million there, I’d rather just let that build up and just keep it @realDonaldTrump, it’s working — and the tweeting, I thought I’d do less of it, but I’m covered so dishonestly by the press — so dishonestly — that I can put out Twitter — and it’s not 140, it’s now 280 — I can go bing bing bing … and they put it on and as soon as I tweet it out — this morning on television, Fox — ‘Donald Trump, we have breaking news.'”
“Bing bing bing” … well, Trump does have more followers than the POTUS account (which has 13.5 million), but the eschewing of the label also signals that Trump will continue to be a renegade, a non-traditional president in the digital age, if you will.
In addition, Kelly O’Donnell of NBC News tweets word from transition officials who confirm that Trump will be mostly tweeting from his personal account, but the White House accounts will likely be used by his staff.
Transition sources tell me @realDonaldTrump intends to keep using his own account as president, not switching to @potus himself
— Kelly O'Donnell (@KellyO) January 16, 2017
The White House social media accounts do transfer to the new administration and could still be used by Trump staff
— Kelly O'Donnell (@KellyO) January 16, 2017
(Via The Sunday Times & NBC’s Kelly O’Donnell on Twitter)