by Chris White
President Donald Trump’s reelection campaign may create a profile on what is being called the conservative version of Twitter, Politico reported Tuesday, citing an anonymous source inside the president’s campaign.
“It’s something he’s aware of and is checking out,” a senior Trump campaign official told Politico, referring to the president’s social media manager, Brad Parscale. “We don’t currently have a plan to make a big move to the platform.” The official was responding to questions about Parler, a fledgling social media network created in 2018 that caters to conservatives.
Parscale and Utah Sen. Mike Lee, a Republican, both began posting on the site in May. Pundits Gavin McInnes, Laura Loomer and Milo Yiannopoulos joined after they were booted from Twitter, a Silicon Valley company some conservatives believe is biased in favor of liberal views.
Firebrand Alex Jones, who was permanently banned from Twitter in 2018, has yet to join Parler but is linked up on Gab, another conservative competitor to Twitter.
The structure of the Parler app is similar to that of Twitter. User posts are limited to 1,000 characters, which other users can then support by “voting”and “echoing,” as opposed to “liking” and “retweeting.” But the company is a long way from competing with Twitter, or any other social media company for that matter, according to CEO John Matze.
The site has roughly 100,000 users in total, he told Politico. Twitter, by comparison, claims 326 million. Trump’s campaign, meanwhile, is syncing itself deeper into social media platforms like Facebook to push back against perceived bias.
“We’re a significant advertiser so we make sure our viewpoint is heard,” the senior official told Politico. Trump’s campaign has spent roughly $5 million on Facebook ads heading into the presidential election, more than any of his Democratic rivals, media reports show.
– – –
Chris White is a reporter for the Daily Caller News Foundation. Follow Chris on Facebook and Twitter.
Background Photo by Parler.com.
