For a brief period of time on Thursday night, Donald Trump's Twitter account was suspended, resulting in social media going viral. Once the account restored, the president decided to give his thoughts.
Trump on Twitter
Not long after Donald Trump kicked off his campaign for president, he found a way to bypass more traditional news outlets after clashing with the media on a routine basis. The former host of "The Apprentice" decided that reaching out to his supporters on social media was a more effective way to push his message without getting directly challenged by reporters and journalists.
Since announcing his candidacy, Trump has been able to gain nearly 42 million followers as his war of words continues with the press. Since his election win over Hillary Clinton, Trump has only increased his frustration with the media, labeling any story he doesn't agree with as "fake news." On Thursday night, Trump's tweeting came to a halt when a Twitter employee on his last day on the job decided to go rogue and deactivate the president's account. "Earlier today @realdonaldtrump’s account was inadvertently deactivated due to human error by a Twitter employee," Twitter's offical government account tweeted. "We are continuing to investigate and are taking steps to prevent this from happening again," the account went on to point out.
In response, Twitter went viral as many celebrated what they thought was Trump finally being booted from the platform. However, the president's account was soon restored, leading to Trump commenting on the incident during a November 3 tweet of his own.
The Twitter employee who deleted Donald Trump's account is being hailed as a hero https://t.co/LyQCW15duc pic.twitter.com/5iDc43xC5T
— Newsweek (@Newsweek) November 3, 2017
During his Friday morning tweetstorm, Donald Trump broke his silence about his Twitter account being taken offline for a brief moment on Thursday night.
"My Twitter account was taken down for 11 minutes by a rogue employee," Trump tweeted out. "I guess the word must finally be getting out-and having an impact," he concluded. As expected, the commander in chief was soon mocked over his response.
Earlier today @realdonaldtrump’s account was inadvertently deactivated due to human error by a Twitter employee. The account was down for 11 minutes, and has since been restored. We are continuing to investigate and are taking steps to prevent this from happening again.
— Twitter Government (@TwitterGov) November 3, 2017
Twitter responds
After acknowledging that his Twitter account was suspended, Donald Trump was met with backlash from many of his critics.
"So you out of your mind and back in 11 minutes," one tweet read.
What "word" is getting out? The fact that you are a Tweeting Lunatic?
— Ed Krassenstein (@EdKrassen) November 3, 2017
This is absolutely outrageous and unacceptable and will not be tolerated! 11 minutes is far too short!
— SLAW (@rslukusa) November 3, 2017
Huge kudos to the #Twitter employee who did this! Next time - make it longer than 11 minutes, please!
— Sister Resister (@JaceLGalloway) November 3, 2017
"We just figured it was Mueller ...he'll be taking you down permanently soon. There are no gold toilets in prison bro," one Twitter user wrote. "This is absolutely outrageous and unacceptable and will not be tolerated! 11 minutes is far too short!" one tweet stated.
Wrong. People are fed up with a POTUS using Twitter as a Bully Pulpit.
— its me, Sharon (@SharonBrashears) November 3, 2017
We just figured it was Mueller ...he'll be taking you down permanently soon. There are no gold toilets in prison bro.
— Braylen's Daddy (@BraylenNapier) November 3, 2017
So you out of your mind and back in 11 minutes..
— 🇵🇰 (@Mr_Sleeep) November 3, 2017
Donald Trump got furious when his Twitter was taken away for 11 minutes.
— Tommy Campbell (@MrTommyCampbell) November 3, 2017
Think how mad he'll be when his presidency is taken away forever.
"What "word" is getting out? The fact that you are a Tweeting Lunatic?" one social media user wondered. "Wrong. People are fed up with a POTUS using Twitter as a Bully Pulpit," yet another tweet noted. The negative reaction continued as those who oppose Donald Trump are not holding back their thoughts about the current president.