Trump insists he has no plans to rejoin Twitter even if Elon Musk reinstates his account

Former President Donald Trump said Monday he would have no interest in rejoining Twitter even if his account were reinstated by Elon Musk, insisting that he plans instead to stick with his fledgling social media network, Truth Social.

“I am not going on Twitter, I am going to stay on TRUTH,” Trump told Fox News in a statement that was issued shortly before Musk’s $44 billion buyout offer for Twitter was accepted unanimously by the company’s board.

“I hope Elon buys Twitter because he’ll make improvements to it and he is a good man, but I am going to be staying on TRUTH,” Trump’s statement read.

Musk, the outspoken billionaire chief executive of Tesla, has said he plans to take Twitter private and minimize the policing of its content.

Trump was permanently suspended by Twitter, as well as by Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat, for what the companies described as his role in inciting violence during the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. His Twitter account, which had more than 88 million followers, was initially suspended for 12 hours during the riot after he condemned then-Vice President Mike Pence, who was in the process of certifying Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory.

“After close review of recent Tweets from the @realDonaldTrump account and the context around them, we have permanently suspended the account due to the risk of further incitement of violence,” Twitter said in a tweet announcing the permanent ban.

After leaving office, Trump announced plans to create his own social media platform, Truth Social, which saw a turbulent launch last month.

Trump himself is not yet on the platform, which has struggled to attract users. The former president told Fox that he will formally join “over the next seven days, as planned.”

As a candidate, Trump used Twitter as a cudgel to help propel him to the presidency. Shortly after his victory in the 2016 presidential election, he said he wasn’t sure how much he’d use Twitter once he got to the White House.

“I’m going to be very restrained, if I use it at all,” Trump told the CBS newsmagazine “60 Minutes” days after the 2016 election.

But his use of Twitter only seemed to intensify while in office, with Trump using the social media platform to spar with critics, float conspiracies and provoke foreign adversaries.