Trump and Twitter

Al Ghad’s Mohammad Momani said that US President Donald Trump has been clashing with Twitter. Momani said that Trump has threatened Twitter with “strong regulation” and even “closing down” after accusing it of ideological bias for liberals against conservatives.

This is after the site fact-checked and added a warning label to a tweet of his that accused the California governor of attempting to tamper with the elections through allowing mail-in voting or postal votes in compliance with anti-COVID-19 social distancing, the writer said.

The columnist said that Trump’s war against Twitter is amusing considering how he himself used to say that he became president thanks to using the platform.

The US president himself used to complain about fake news and debunk them via his Twitter account, Momani said, pointing to Trump’s “self-contradicting”, “undemocratic” and “politically confused” behaviour by bashing Twitter for fact-checking information that he posted.

The columnist said that social media has its many pros, but among its prominent cons are spreading false and misleading news, which could lead to destabilising communities, along with privacy transgressions and providing platforms to ignorant and extreme mobs to broadcast their corrupt ideas.

He highlighted that countries have been pressuring social media corporations to further regulate use of their platforms to battle such unacceptable cons, noting that the corporations have responded to demands by launching fact-checking mechanisms and concluding agreements with trusted news institutions to help fact-check information on their sites.

Momani said that Trump ought to be happy about news verification on social media and even demand more of it for everyone’s sake.