Twitter reinstated Donald Trump’s account after a slim majority of votes were cast in a poll organized by Elon Musk, in favor of reinstating the former US president, who was banned from the social media service after the Capitol riot.

Musk posted a tweet with an open-access poll asking users if Trump should be reinstated on the platform.

The poll ran for 24 hours and garnered over 15 million votes, with a slim majority (51.8%) being in favor.

“The people have spoken. Trump will be reinstated. Vox Populi, Vox Dei,” Musk tweeted

Minutes after Musk tweeted the results, Trump was reinstated on Twitter.

Trump encouraged his followers to vote on the poll, although he suggested that he would not return to Twitter.

During his 2020 reelection campaign, Trump falsely suggested that postal voting or electoral fraud may compromise the election, prompting Twitter to either remove such tweets or label them as disputed.

After his election loss, Trump persistently undermined the election results in the weeks leading to Joe Biden's inauguration. His tweets played a role in inciting the January 6, 2021, attack of the US Capitol during the formal counting of electoral votes.

Though the Senate eventually acquitted Trump during his second impeachment, social media companies swiftly banned him. Facebook and Instagram announced a permanent ban (although, in June 2021, they said they would revisit the ban in January 2023).

Twitter permanently suspended his @realDonaldTrump handle, followed by the official account of his campaign (@TeamTrump) and the accounts of allies who posted on his behalf, like Trump campaign digital director Gary Coby.

Twitter also deleted three tweets by Trump on the @POTUS handle and barred access to the presidential account until Joe Biden's inauguration.

During the first week that Trump was banned on several platforms (January 9–15), election-related misinformation declined 73 percent, according to research analytics firm Zignal Labs. (ILKHA)

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