On Tuesday, Tesla chief Elon Musk said that he would reverse Twitter’s earlier decision to ban former US President Donald Trump. Musk was speaking at the Financial Times Future of the Car conference
Speaking at a summit, the billionaire investor-inventor Elon Musk said that banning Donald Trump from Twitter was morally wrong and “flat-out stupid”. Musk said that the decision to ban Trump from Twitter did not silence the former president’s voice but rather amplified his views among people on the political right.
Musk, who refers to himself as a “free speech absolutist”, also added that he and Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey believe permanent bans should be “extremely rare” and reserved for accounts that operate bots or spread spam.
Former United States President Donald Trump was permanently suspended from Twitter shortly after the January 6 riot on the US Capitol. The micro-blogging site had claimed that Trump’s account would further risk incitement of violence as it arbitrarily banned him from the platform.
Ever since Elon Musk launched his hostile Twitter takeover bid promising free speech on the platform, there has been intense speculation regarding the return of Donald Trump on Twitter. However, interestingly, the former President himself does not intend to return to the platform.
Recently, Trump had categorically stated that he has no plans to go back to Twitter. Trump further noted that he would stick to his own social media platform, Truth Social, instead. Donald Trump has confirmed he is not interested in returning to Twitter, even if the social media platform now led by Elon Musk reinstated his account.
However, Trump did see the Twitter takeover by Elon Musk as a positive development. “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,” he had said.
