Trump’s Executive Order on Social Media Is to Soothe His Ego
Statement of Robert Weissman, President, Public Citizen
Note: President Donald Trump today signed an executive order targeting social media companies after Twitter placed fact checks on two of his misleading tweets.
As we’ve seen in the past, Trump plans to issue an executive order that, based on the draft circulating, appears to have little or no effect except to soothe his ego and spark criticism of anyone or anything he believes to be an enemy.
An American president deploying ill-informed broadsides against the U.S. Constitution for a political ploy is dangerous, and we can’t lose sight of that simply because it seems to happen so often.
We need real accountability for the damage online platforms have done to civil rights, competition and our democracy – not more hollow and inflammatory rhetoric.