Former President Trump joined the social media platform TikTok on Saturday and within 24 hours of setting up his account, he had more followers than the Biden campaign.
Trump and his team First video posted On Saturday night, a video was posted to TikTok featuring the former president and Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) president Dana White at a UFC title fight in New Jersey.
The video begins with White telling the camera, “The president is on TikTok right now,” to which Trump responds, “It’s an honor.” The 13-second clip then cuts to Trump entering Saturday night’s game at the Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey, and greeting fans and other spectators.
The video had garnered more than 2.3 million likes and 38 million views in 15 hours as of 2 p.m. Sunday. Trump’s account It has more than 2.2 million followers, more than six times the number of followers of the Biden-Harris HQ account, which was launched in February.
The Hill has reached out to the Trump campaign for further comment.
During his presidency, Trump tried to ban TikTok with an executive order that would have forced TikTok’s Chinese parent company, ByteDance, to sell its U.S. assets, an order that was later blocked in court.
President Trump opposed the latest effort to ban TikTok earlier this year, arguing it would benefit Facebook, which banned him following the attack on the Capitol in January 2021. Amid growing national security concerns over the app’s ties to China, he placed the onus on President Biden as a bill to potentially ban the app works its way through Congress and reaches the president’s desk.
The bill was swiftly signed by President Biden in late April, setting a deadline for ByteDance to stop selling the app or face being banned from U.S. app stores and networks.
MAGA Inc., President Trump’s super PAC, joined TikTok last month under the handle @MAGA, and as of Sunday had garnered more than 17,000 followers and 176,000 likes since launch.
“MAGA INC will not cede any platform to Joe Biden and the Democratic Party who are trying to destroy our country,” MAGA Inc. CEO Taylor Budowicz said last month about the super PAC’s TikTok launch. “We will ensure President Trump’s America First agenda reaches every corner of the internet and every constituency in this country.”
The move to join both platforms may signal an attempt to attract younger voters ahead of November, with Trump and Biden trailing in national polls.
Even as the legal battle rages on, Trump maintains a slim lead of 1.5 points over Biden, according to a poll by The Hill and Decision Desk HQ.
The social media post came just days after Trump was convicted in New York state on all 34 counts of falsifying business records, making him the first former U.S. president to be convicted of a crime.
The charges relate to repaying hush money paid to adult film actress Stormy Daniels to Michael Cohen, Trump’s former fixer and lawyer.
The verdict is scheduled to be handed down on July 11, four days before the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Trump’s legal team has vowed to appeal, but in the meantime the process is expected to proceed as scheduled.
Copyright 2024 Nexstar Media Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
