The political calculus of Trump’s 24-hour social media blitz
At 10:30 p.m. Monday evening, President Donald Trump’s verified TruthSocial account reposted a message on social media that accused former President Barack Obama and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton of “Treason,” a crime that could lead to the death penalty.
Seventeen minutes later, he reshared a post that labeled Obama a “DEMONIC FORCE.” In the same minute, he reposted a message claiming without evidence that the 2020 election was “Stolen.”
He followed that up two minutes later, amplifying another debunked theory about the 2020 election he lost.
That is just a snippet of the more than 70 social media posts shared between 7:56 a.m. ET Monday and 8:03 a.m. ET Tuesday by the president’s official account on Truth Social, the social media platform owned by a company of which he is one of the largest shareholders.
A White House spokesman said the president was keeping up with his habit of direct and frequent communication, which, the spokesman said, the public appreciates and the media benefit from.
“President Trump is the most transparent and accessible President in American history to the media and his return to the White House saved the legacy media from going out of business,” White House spokesman Davis Ingle said in a statement to Straight Arrow. “The press know that they can’t get enough of Trump, and the American people appreciate hearing his first-hand insights on topics of importance to our country.”
One communication consultant who works with Republicans said the high volume of posts about a range of topics that include norm-breaking insults and provocations is purposeful and unique to Trump.
“Others may try and imitate but I don’t think it’ll work for them,” consultant Bill O’Reilly said. “It’s his style of distracting, keeping people looking at different things.”
What did the president post?
The flurry began at 7:56 a.m EST. Monday morning, four minutes before he was scheduled to begin “Executive Time” at the White House. He posted a link to a right-leaning website with a mixed record on factuality, which described Texas Republicans’ fighting against “what they call security and cultural risks from the state’s growing Muslim population.”
Then, after about 10 hours of inactivity, the account posted an upbeat message about the president’s upcoming trip to China and six announcements about federal judicial nominations. After that came a slew of more controversial posts and amplification of unverified claims.
There was one about “Obama’s Coup Plot”, several nearly year-old news clips accusing Obama and another top official of having “fabricated the Russia Hoax,” and at least one video from One America News falsely claiming “Election systems across the US are found to have deleted millions of votes cast for President Trump.” The station settled a defamation case in 2024 after it made similar claims about another election technology company.
The posts continued into Tuesday morning, at which time he posted several AI-generated images of Democrats in unflattering situations.
What, if anything, did this accomplish?
The posts serve as an example of what Trump’s former campaign manager and senior adviser Steve Bannon has often referred to as an effort to “flood the zone with s—.”
O’Reilly attributed Trump’s recent posts not only to Trump’s larger-than-life persona, but also to advice from Trump’s one-time lawyer, Roy Cohn. O’Reilly said Cohn’s strategy was to be relentless and aggressive: “Always be on offense, always be putting out material. If you’re not feeding the press, they’re attacking you.”
The effect, O’Reilly said, is to put Trump’s political opponents off-message, even if it gives them ammunition for an attack.
“He lures Democrats and progressives in a million different directions every day, and they don’t have a coherent message” because they’re reacting to him, O’Reilly said. “There’s no room for anything else, and all you can do is respond.”
Another communication professional said the flurry of posts like Trump’s served to energize his supporters as well as people who spend a lot of time online.
“He knows how to energize his base,” said Rachel Noerdlinger, a partner at the global public strategy company Actum. “Even outside of his base, people are attracted to mess right now.”
Noerdlinger, a longtime associate of Rev. Al Sharpton and one-time aide in a Democratic mayoral administration in New York, criticized Trump’s posts as childish and “manic.”
“There are people who find him humorous and entertaining,” Noerdlinger said, adding that she found that to be “sad.”
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Ella Rae Greene, Editor In Chief
