Nov 2, 2019 - Politics & Policy

What Trump uses Twitter for

Orion Rummler

Illustration of a Twitter bird with President Trump's hair and a string tied around it's beak. — Illustration: Aïda Amer/Axios

A New York Times analysis found that over half of President Trump's more than 11,000 tweets to date have been attacks. Key stats: He has tweeted 570 attacks against immigrants and tweeted praise to dictators 132 times.

Be smart: "... some of the topics on which Mr. Trump gets the most 'likes' and retweets — jabs at the N.F.L., posts about the special counsel’s investigation, unfounded allegations of widespread voter fraud — poll poorly with the general public," per the Times.

Details: Trump has retweeted "white nationalists, anti-Muslim bigots and adherents of QAnon" among other unverified accounts, dozens of which have been suspended by Twitter. He has boasted about applause and crowd size at his events 183 times and called out news media as the “enemy of the people” 36 times.

Of note: Trump's top aides "discussed asking Twitter to impose a 15-minute delay on his account" early in his presidency, the Times reports.

But, aides "quickly abandoned the idea after recognizing the political peril if it the idea leaked to the press — or to their boss."

Go deeper: Trump's tweets are losing their potency

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What Trump uses Twitter for

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