Donald Trump has been reinstated on Twitter – but will he return to the platform fully?

The former US president has voiced his commitment to his Truth Social platform, writes Chris Stevenson. But for how long will he resist the temptation to return to Twitter?

Elon Musk has reinstated Donald Trump’s account on Twitter (AP)

Donald Trump is back on Twitter. Or at least, his account has been reinstated by Elon Musk.

Musk, who recently bought the social media platform for $44bn (£37bn), initiated a poll on reinstating the former US president’s account. Trump was suspended in 2021 over the risk of incitement of violence, in the days that followed the storming of the US Capitol. And not just from Twitter: his Facebook, Instagram and YouTube accounts were also suspended. After more than 15 million votes, it emerged that 51.8 per cent of those who had taken part in the Twitter poll had voted to restore Trump’s account.

At the time of writing, the last tweet on the account is from 8 January 2021, and it doesn’t take much scrolling back to see tweets containing the former president’s false claims that he had won the 2020 presidential election against Joe Biden. The account is also down from 88 million followers in 2021 to around 52 million.