Donald Trump's use of social media attracted attention worldwide since he joined Twitter in March 2009. Over nearly twelve years, Trump tweeted around 57,000 times, including about 8,000 times during the 2016 election campaign and over 25,000 times during his presidency. The White House said the tweets should be considered official statements. When Twitter banned Trump from the platform in January 2021 during the final days of his term, his handle @realDonaldTrump had over 88.9 million followers. For most of Trump's first presidency, his account on Twitter, where he often posted controversial and false statements, remained unmoderated in the name of "public interest". Congress performed its own form of moderation, and in the face of this political censure, his tweets only accelerated.
During his 2020 reelection campaign, he falsely suggested that postal voting or electoral fraud may compromise the election, and after his election loss, Trump persistently undermined the election results, and his tweets played a role in inciting the attack of the US Capitol. Though the Senate eventually acquitted Trump during his second impeachment, social media companies swiftly banned him. Facebook and Instagram banned him for two years. During the first week in January 2021 that Trump was banned on several platforms, election-related misinformation declined 73 percent, according to research analytics firm Zignal Labs. In November 2022, Twitter's new owner, Elon Musk, reinstated his account, although Trump had stated he would not use it in favor of his own social media platform, Truth Social. In April 2023, at his arraignment hearing, Trump was warned by Acting New York Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan not to use social media to incite violence.
Background
The emergence of social media has changed the way in which political communication takes place in the United States. Political institutions such as politicians, political parties, foundations, institutions, and political think tanks are all using social media platforms, like Facebook and Twitter, to communicate with and engage voters. Regular individuals, politicians, "pundits" and thought leaders alike are able to voice their opinions, engage with a wide network, and connect with other likeminded individuals. Trump used narrowcasting as well as broadcasting on traditional media to good effect. His 2024 campaign and second presidency made frequent use of AI-generated content and memes to attract attention, many of them portraying Trump as outlandish pop-culture icons. Several posts received criticism for being insensitive and dehumanizing, such as in images portraying himself as the Pope or mocking immigrants being deported.
Platforms
For most of Trump's first term, his account on Twitter, where he often posted controversial and false statements, remained unmoderated in the name of "public interest". Congress performed its own form of moderation in June 2019, the House of Representatives voted mostly along party lines to censure him for "racist comments" he had tweeted two days previously. In the face of this political censure, his tweets only accelerated. An investigation by The New York Times published November 2, 2019, found that, during his time in office to date, Trump had already retweeted at least 145 accounts that "have pushed conspiracy or fringe content, including more than two dozen that have since been suspended."
After years of criticism for allowing Trump to post misinformation and falsehoods, Twitter began to tag some of his tweets with fact-checks in May 2020. In response, he said social media platforms "totally silence" conservatives and he would "strongly regulate, or close them down". During his 2020 reelection campaign, he falsely suggested that postal voting or electoral fraud may compromise the election, prompting Twitter to either remove such tweets or label them as disputed. After his election loss, Trump persistently undermined the election results in the weeks leading to Joe Biden's inauguration. His tweets played a role in inciting the January 2021, attack of the US Capitol during the formal counting of electoral votes. After his second impeachment, Twitter permanently suspended his @realDonaldTrump handle, followed by the official account of his campaign (@TeamTrump) and the accounts of allies who posted on his behalf, like Trump campaign digital director Gary Coby. Twitter also deleted three tweets by Trump on the @POTUS handle and barred access to the presidential account until Joe Biden's inauguration.
As Trump continued to issue brief statements, his spokesperson Liz Harrington tweeted screenshots of them under the Save America logo from June 2021 to June 2022. In November 2022, Twitter's new owner, Elon Musk, reinstated his account, and the first tweet since 2021 was made in August 2023 about his mugshot from Fulton County Jail, but the account remained inactive until he tweeted again in August 2024. In April 2023, at his arraignment hearing, Trump was warned by Acting New York Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan not to use social media to incite violence.
Facebook and Instagram
Banned from both platforms
On January 6, 2021, amidst an attack at the Capitol while Congress was counting the electoral votes, Trump posted a short video. Facebook removed it and blocked Trump's ability to post new content to both platforms. Facebook's vice president of integrity, Guy Rosen, explained that the video "contributes to rather than diminishes the risk of ongoing violence." (YouTube also removed the same video. Twitter at first disabled comments; later, the Tweet was deleted.) The next day, Facebook said the block would remain at least until the end of Trump's term on January 20. On May 5, 2021, after considering whether to reinstate Trump's account, Facebook's Oversight Board upheld Trump's suspensions on Facebook and Instagram but instructed Meta Platforms to reassess the indefinite ban within six months, stating that "it is not permissible for Facebook to keep a user off the platform for an undefined period, with no criteria for when or whether the account will be restored." One month later, Facebook decided to extend Trump's ban to two years, as his actions "merit the highest penalty available under the new enforcement protocols," and reconsider his case no earlier than January 7, 2023.
On July 7, 2021, Trump announced class action lawsuits against Facebook, Twitter, and Google for alleged censorship of conservative voices. In January 2025, Meta Platforms agreed to pay $25 million to settle the lawsuit against Facebook, with $22 million going to Trump's future presidential library and the remainder to legal fees and other litigants.
On February 7, 2023, Meta reinstated Trump on Facebook and Instagram, having announced two weeks earlier that the risk to public safety had "sufficiently receded." Meta said there would be “new guardrails in place to deter repeat offenses" and that Trump could be banned for up to two years at a time in the future if he reoffends.
On March 17, 2023, Trump made his first Facebook post since his reinstatement: a video clip of his victory speech following the 2016 presidential election in which he stated, "Sorry to keep you waiting. Complicated business. Complicated."
Facebook During his 2016 campaign, Trump posted a number of ads on his Facebook page attacking Hillary Clinton. The ads included parodies of Pokémon Go and Ms. Pac-Man, portraying Hillary Clinton as a Pokémon and as Ms. Pac-Man. Trump was charged less per ad than Clinton was, Wired claimed, but Facebook countered that Trump had been charged more.
Trump also used the platform to issue an apology for the Access Hollywood tape. As president, he was criticized for posting a news story about a purported Kuwaiti travel ban similar to Executive Order 13769; Kuwait's foreign minister confirmed that no such ban existed.
In 2017, Facebook briefed the House and Senate committees in their investigations of Russian interference in the US election. At the hearings, Facebook revealed that accounts linked to the Russian government had bought approximately $100,000 of Facebook advertisements during the election campaign. In response, Trump criticized Facebook in a series of tweets on September 27, 2017. "Facebook was always anti-Trump," he said, simultaneously extending the same criticism to "the Networks," The New York Times, and The Washington Post. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg posted a statement to Facebook: "Trump says Facebook is against him. Liberals say we helped Trump. Both sides are upset about ideas and content they don't like. That's what running a platform for all ideas looks like."
A large Facebook group called "Stop the Steal" was dedicated to the idea that the November 2020 election was "stolen" from Trump by some type of fraud. Two days after the election, Facebook banned the group and its hashtags.
Instagram Trump initially used his personal account on Instagram (@realDonaldTrump) primarily to share personal pictures, including images of himself with his grandchildren. In September 2015 – then with approximately 377thousand followers– he used the platform to release a political advertisement. This ad, "Act of Love", attacked primary opponent Jeb Bush on the topic of immigration. Along with Bush's responses, it demonstrated that Instagram could be a political tool rather than merely a personal photo-sharing application. Trump also used the platform to contribute to the controversy regarding the 2016 film Ghostbusters by posting a video criticizing the all-female cast. In response, director Paul Feig claimed that "Trump supporters" were responsible for some of the "internet hate" directed at the film.
When Trump became president, his personal account had grown to over 5million followers. He also assumed control of an official account (@whitehouse), where he posted pictures from his inauguration. At that time, it was expected that the official account would primarily feature the work of the Chief Official White House Photographer once one was selected; however, Shealah Craighead has contributed relatively little, especially in comparison to Pete Souza's work during the Obama administration.
Reddit On July 27, 2016, Trump took part in an Ask Me Anything (AMA), where he responded to user-submitted questions from Reddit's r/The_Donald community. He offered replies on topics that varied from media bias and voter fraud to NASA, including a question about H-1B visas posed by far-right media personality Milo Yiannopoulos. Trump also posted several pre-debate messages on the subreddit.
YouTube From 2011 until 2013 or 2014, Trump created over 80 installments of a vlog on YouTube called "From the Desk of Donald Trump". In it, he discussed a variety of topics, ranging from serious issues such as the Libyan Civil War, Obamacare, and the American job market to less weighty matters, including the Vanity Fair Oscar party and his dislike of Mike McGlone's Rhetorical Questions advertisements for GEICO. In several installments, he speculated on a possible presidential candidacy in 2012 that never came to pass, but many of the themes featured in the vlog were part of his successful campaign in 2016. By June 2017, most of these videos were no longer available on YouTube under Trump's account.