OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
Former President Trump made some interesting comments after Tesla CEO Elon Musk successfully acquired Twitter.
During an interview with Fox News, Trump made it clear he doesn’t plan on returning to Twitter and instead plans to use his own TRUTH Social as the sole platform for his voice.
The 45th president told Fox News that he will formally join his own TRUTH Social over the next week.
“I am not going on Twitter, I am going to stay on TRUTH,” Trump said. “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.”
“We’re taking in millions of people, and what we’re finding is that the response on TRUTH is much better than being on Twitter,” Trump said. “Twitter has bots and fake accounts, and we are doing everything we can.”
He added: “The bottom line is, no, I am not going back to Twitter.”
When asked if Musk taking over Twitter could be competition to TRUTH, Trump said he believes it will be good overall for social media.
“I think it is good. We want liberty and justice and fairness in our country, and the more we can have open, the better,” Trump said. “But no, I don’t view that as a competition for what I am doing.”
“This is a platform for my voice. TRUTH is a platform for my voice and for my supporters,” Trump said. “But I want everybody to come over to TRUTH—conservatives, liberals, whatever.”
Trump said Twitter “became very boring because conservatives were thrown off or got off the platform when I left.”
“It became boring because there was no interaction,” Trump said. “The interaction on TRUTH has been amazing.”
He added: “We want everybody.”
“TRUTH Social will be a voice for me,” Trump continued. “And that’s something nobody else can get.”
Twitter’s board of directors announced on Monday that it had accepted Elon Musk’s $44 billion offer to buy the social media platform.
Reports began breaking on Monday morning that Twitter’s board and members of Musk’s team had spent hours negotiating terms and came to a deal.
“Twitter Inc is nearing a deal to sell itself to Elon Musk for $54.20 per share in cash, the price that he originally offered to the social media company and called his ‘best and final’, people familiar with the matter said,” Reuters reported.
“Twitter may announce the $43 billion deal later on Monday once its board has met to recommend the transaction to Twitter shareholders, the sources said. It is always possible that the deal collapses at the last minute, the sources added. Twitter has not been able to secure so far a ‘go-shop’ provision under its agreement with Musk that would allow it to solicit other bids from potential acquirers once the deal is signed, the sources said. Still, Twitter would be allowed to accept an offer from another party by paying Musk a break-up fee, the sources added,” the report added.
On Sunday, it was reported that Twitter changed course on Musk’s multi-billion dollar offer to buy out the social media company.
Musk disclosed in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing that he has secured the money to buy Twitter outright.
“Twitter had been expected to rebuff the offer, which Mr. Musk made earlier this month without saying how he would pay for it,” The Wall Street Journal reported. “But after he disclosed last week that he now has $46.5 billion in the financing, Twitter is taking a fresh look at the offer and is more likely than before to seek to negotiate.”
The WSJ report said negotiations between Twitter and Musk are “fast-moving” and that the company is expected to “weigh in on the bid” later this week.
“The potential turnabout on Twitter’s part comes after Mr. Musk met privately Friday with several shareholders of the company to extol the virtues of his proposal while repeating that the board has a ‘yes-or-no’ decision to make,” the report added. “He also pledged to solve the free-speech issues he sees as plaguing the platform and the country more broadly, whether his bid succeeds or not.”
In his SEC filing, Musk reported that he had secured $46.5 billion from three sources to buy the company, including $13 billion from Morgan Stanley, $12.5 billion from other banks, and $21 billion from himself.
