The Hip Social Media Platform for a President - Twitter

In the last year Twitter has quickly risen as the a channel for politicians, celebrities, and other popular figures to communicate messages to the “common person.” Particularly in the realm of politics, the social media platform has become the new way for politicians to put out quick statements to followers. For example, on September 22nd Senator John McCain used Twitter to share how he would vote on the Graham-Cassidy.

Similar to how Senator McCain and other politicians have used Twitter to share their statements, President Trump has also taken the same route throughout his presidency and campaign, however, using a far less professional tone. Trump’s tweets are clearly not proofread by a member on his staff and come across as more of an attack. Trump has used Twitter to share his plan to ban transgender individuals from serving in the military, threaten North Korea, and most recently condemn NFL players who protest the national anthem.

In addition, Trump has used his Twitter account to retweet incredibly offensive and immature tweets. On September 17th, Trump retweeted a GIF that was edited to show him swinging a golf club and hit Hillary Clinton with a golf ball so hard she falls down.

For any president, let alone public figure or official, to retweet and tweet something typically is meant to be taken seriously. However, with Trump we often let the fact that these messages are put out on Twitter, as opposed to in a press conference or official White House statement, belittle the action itself. So how seriously should we take these tweets and retweets?

The fact is, is that these tweets are statements made on behalf of the president. Twitter has broken down a wall between the president and civilians and allowed for the president to communicate more candidly with the American people.

In July during an interview with ABC News Chief Political Analyst Matt Dowd, commented:

“we shouldn't think of these just [as] tweets. They’re our official statements of the president of the United States from the White House. That's how we ought to view them. And so this would just be as much of a statement as he’d give in a speech or give in a piece of paper that the White House sends out. These are official statements of the president and they should be reported out.”

Tweets are statements. Retweets are endorsements. It is as simple as that.

In a time when social media allows for us to be more transparent with our thoughts and connect with public figures and officials easier, we have to evolve the way we look at social media. Just because Donald Trump is saying something on Twitter doesn’t lessen the content or mean we shouldn’t take it seriously. More than ever, Twitter is allowing for us to see politicians in an unfiltered setting and we should use this to our advantage. We have to use Twitter question the messages that our politicians put out and push back accordingly.

Wargo, Matt. “'Common Sense': How Twitter Can Affect Politics.” ABC News, ABC News Network, 7 July 2017, abcnews.go.com/Politics/common-sense-twitter-affect-politics/story?id=48505359.

Summers, Juana. “Retweet Isn't Endorsement Unless You're President.” CNN, Cable News Network, 17 Sept. 2017, www.cnn.com/2017/09/17/politics/donald-trump-hillary-clinton-golf-violence/index.html.