The Biden campaign is in search of any edge with voters who could be persuaded to his side.
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President Biden’s campaign said it had joined Truth Social “mostly because we thought it would be very funny.”
Officials with President Biden’s re-election campaign have long pledged to meet voters where they are. On Monday the campaign began a project to meet former President Donald J. Trump’s voters where they are — on his social media platform.
“Let’s see how this goes,” the campaign’s account wrote on Monday in its first post on Truth Social. “Converts welcome!”
The Biden campaign painted its debut on Mr. Trump’s outlet as a cheeky opportunity to troll the president’s likely general election opponent. Mr. Trump launched Truth Social in April 2022 in response to being blocked from mainstream social media platforms a day after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. Their actions came after he published inaccurate and inflammatory messages during that day of violence.
“There’s very little ‘truth’ happening on Truth Social, but at least now it’ll be a little fun,” Kevin Munoz, a Biden campaign spokesman, said.
On X, formerly known as Twitter, the Biden campaign said it had joined the platform “mostly because we thought it would be very funny.” The decision marks a shift from the campaign’s previously stated position that it would not join the Trump platform, as reported by Axios in May.
Mr. Biden, who won the 2020 presidential election by narrow margins in just a handful of battleground states, is in search of any edge he can get with voters who could be persuaded to vote for him.
Voters who consume conservative media have long been considered a rich target for Democratic candidates. During the 2020 campaign, Democrats were split on engaging with Fox News, which party officials at the time said had more persuadable voters among its viewers than any other cable network had.
Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts called Fox News a “hate for profit” operation and refused its invitations for a town hall, while Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, an independent, and Pete Buttigieg, then a former mayor of South Bend, Ind., accepted. Mr. Buttigieg, now Mr. Biden’s transportation secretary, is often dispatched to explain the administration’s positions on Fox News.
Reid J. Epstein covers campaigns and elections from Washington. Before joining The Times in 2019, he worked at The Wall Street Journal, Politico, Newsday and The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. More about Reid J. Epstein
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Source: nytimes.com
