In this photo illustration, the official page of the President-elect of the United States, Joe Biden, on Twitter shown on a smartphone.
Rafael Henrique | LightRocket | Getty Images
The Biden administration will soon manage the official White House Twitter accounts, but the accounts will not come with followers as they did when President Trump took over from Barack Obama in 2017.
A Twitter spokesman confirmed in a statement on Tuesday that when the platform transfers institutional accounts such as @WhiteHouse, @POTUS and @VP on the opening day, “they will not automatically retain their existing followers.” Currently, the @POTUS account has over 33 million followers, while @WhiteHouse has 26 million.
This process is different from the last time the accounts changed hands, which was also the first transition of the accounts since they were created during the Obama era. The accounts retained his followers during this presidential transition.
Obama’s tweets and his administration were filed under new Twitter drivers, a process that will be replicated.
According to the Twitter statement, users who follow the institutional accounts will have to continue following them once they change control.
“For example, people following @WhiteHouse will be notified that the account has been filed as @ WhiteHouse45 and they will be given the option to follow the new @WhiteHouse account,” the spokesman said.
Tuesday before, Biden campaign digital director Rob Flaherty shared on Twitter that the company had informed the Biden team that the accounts would start at zero followers. The request will likely make it easier for Biden to attract many new followers, although it is likely that some users will also decide to stop following them while in the hands of the next administration.
The Biden transition team did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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