How Trump’s Truth Social posts manage to reach mainstream audiences

Senior research manager Jared Holt spoke with The New York Times about the influence former President Donald Trump’s social media platform, Truth Social, has attained in the alternative media landscape, and how Trump’s messaging still manages to reach mainstream audiences.

“If he wants that message to break into the Twittersphere, he needs people to screenshot it or post it or write something about it,” said Jared. “That happens all the time.”

Just this summer, Trump made baseless claims against the FBI, accusing democrats of corrupting the bureau following the search at Mar-a-Lago. One Truth Social user ended up attacking the FBI’s building in Ohio — an “unfortunate” milestone for the platform, according to Jared.

“That was a tell that the platform was reaching a milestone. Because the unfortunate truth is that any platform — once it gets big enough — has to deal with somebody doing something like that.”