Despite being President of the United States and presumably having many important things to do (other than golfing at the "Winter White House (opens in new tab)"), Donald Trump hasn't given up his addiction to Twitter (opens in new tab). The president persistently tweets from his personal account @realDonaldTrump (opens in new tab), with musings ranging from the mundane/egotistical, to diatribes against Arnold Schwarzenegger, to dangerous accusations about wiretapping (opens in new tab). But...WHY?
"Well, let me tell you about Twitter," the President said during an interview with Fox News host Tucker Carlson (opens in new tab). "I think that maybe I wouldn't be here if it wasn't for Twitter because I get such a fake press, such a dishonest press."
That's debatable (most of the media companies Trump takes issue with are extremely reputable), but the key point here is that Trump wants to control his narrative—and if the media won't paint him in a positive light, he'll do it himself.
"There's a lot of fake news," he continued. "So if I'm not going to—if they're not going to do me the honor and the public the honor of spreading my word accurately as it was meant, and you know exactly what I'm talking about, because there's been nobody in history that got more dishonest media than I've gotten. […] So, when I can reach, whether it's 90 million or 100 million or 80 million, however many people it may turn out to be, when you add everything up—and then of course it gets disseminated from there—when I can reach that many people, Twitter is a wonderful thing for me, because I get the word out."
So, what have we learned? Trump is spreading his own gospel, Twitter lets him do it, and he wouldn't be President without it.
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