Here's how Trump's restored Twitter account could help prosecutors
@realDonaldTrump was removed from Twitter in the days following the Jan. 6 attack and after several months of claiming the election was "rigged." When that happened, all of the amplification and promotion of his tweets went along with it.
Presumably, the House Select Committee pulled some information from Twitter, but the newly restored account means that those links to other accounts are also available again.
Former Rep. Denver Riggleman (R-VA) explained that "as somebody who looks at data, who looks at that type of thing, I think this is valuable. I think everyone should look at those individuals who were amplifying this, even public people like Kayleigh McEnany, Tomi Lahren. You look at those people amplifying this ridiculousness, and I think it's a good reminder, a refresher of how insane the Trump White House was around that time."
Sam Stein, who was standing in on MSNBC for Ali Velshi, wondered if there would be any damaging fallout from the incitement that his Twitter account could produce.
"I always do. The scary thing is that hate is a metastasizing agent," said Riggleman. "You saw some of the things Donald Trump re-tweeted. If you go back to 2020, he was retweeting about Seal Team 6 being killed by Obama and Biden. He amplified internet trolls, QAnon trolls on the Obama gave hashtag, but actually came right out of Twitter. So absolutely, I see some of those things as dangerous. We have issues on all the other social media platforms, also. Look at Parlor, Gab, 8Chan, or the Chans, you are looking at all of these types of social media, or the trip code, protected chat rooms, stuff like that. Those are also metastasizing agents."
However, he said that the big issue for him is social media profiting off of threats and violence.
"The ability that digital profits out there can actually make digital prophets, you know? I guess it is an insight into what happened that day," said Riggleman about Jan. 6, 2021. "People can't go read them again and say, the danger that is presented by someone who is completely unhinged, or you know, we intend to keep power any way we could. So seeing the people who are on there again could be a great refresher for the American people."
See the full conversation below or at this link.
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