Elon Musk has reactivated Donald Trump’s Twitter account, nearly two years after the former US president was barred from the network for inciting violence.
Trump’s Twitter account resurfaced on Saturday after Musk, the platform’s new owner, conducted a poll on the social media site, which revealed marginal support for allowing Trump to rejoin.
More than 15 million people voted in the poll, with a tiny majority of 51.8 percent opting in favor of restoring Trump’s account.
“The people have spoken. Trump will be reinstated,” Musk tweeted.
However, Trump stated earlier on Saturday that he has no plans to return to the platform.
“I don’t see any reason for it,” the former president replied via video when a panel at the Republican Jewish Coalition’s annual leadership gathering asked if he wanted to return to Twitter.
Trump stated he would continue with Truth Social, an app established by his Trump Media & Technology Group (TMTG) start-up that he claimed had higher user interaction than Twitter and was performing “phenomenally well.”
Trump, who launched his presidential campaign on Tuesday, hailed Musk and said he had always loved him.
However, the former president stated that Twitter was plagued by bots and phony accounts, and that the difficulties were “incredible.”
Musk originally stated in May that he intended to lift the ban on Trump, and the date of his return was closely monitored – and feared – by many of Twitter’s advertisers.
Musk has now attempted to reassure users and advertisers that such a decision would be taken with the input of a content moderation committee comprised of people with “widely diverse viewpoints,” and that no account reinstatements would take place before the council met.
He also stated that Twitter would not reinstate any banned users unless a “clear process for doing so” was in place.
Musk reinstated comedian Kathy Griffin last week after she was banned for altering her profile name to “Elon Musk,” which violated his new rule against impersonation without noting it was a parody account.
There has been no fresh information about the reinstatement process or the moderation council.
If Trump does not return to Twitter, it may assuage major advertisers, who are already concerned about Musk’s significant reworking of the network.
He has cut the workforce in half and drastically reduced the company’s trust and safety team, which is in charge of preventing the spread of disinformation and hazardous content.
These measures, as well as Musk’s tweets, have prompted major corporations to suspend advertising on the site while they assess how the platform handles hate speech.
Bloomberg reported on Saturday, citing anonymous sources, that Twitter may fire more staff in its sales and partnership divisions, only days after a mass resignation of engineers.
