Hours after Twitter permanently suspended outgoing US President Donald Trump’s account, Trump hit back at the microblogging site and claimed that the move was an attempt to silence him.
Early on Saturday, Twitter announced that it has permanently suspended Trump’s account citing “risk of further incitement of violence”.
"After close review of recent Tweets from the @realDonaldTrump account and the context around them - specifically how they are being received and interpreted on and off Twitter - we have permanently suspended the account due to the risk of further incitement of violence," Twitter said in a statement.
Trump lashed out at the California-based social media website and claimed that neither he nor his supporters could be silenced. At the time of permanent suspension, Trump had 88.7 million followers and followed 51 people.
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In a statement Trump claimed that he predicted that such an action would be taken against him and said that he will soon make a “big announcement”.
"I predicted this would happen. We have been negotiating with various other sites, and will have a big announcement soon, while we also look at the possibilities of building out our own platform in the near future. We will not be SILENCED!"
Trump also hit out at Twitter and alleged that the site was restricting free speech.
“Twitter is not about FREE SPEECH. They are all about promoting a Radical Left platform where some of the most vicious people in the world are allowed to speak freely. "STAY TUNED!"' he said.
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"As I have been saying for a long time, Twitter has gone further and further in banning free speech, and tonight, Twitter employees have coordinated with the Democrats and the Radical Left in removing my account from their platform, to silence me — and YOU, the 75,000,000 great patriots who voted for me," he added.
"Twitter may be a private company, but without the government's gift of Section 230 they would not exist for long," Trump said.
(With PTI inputs)
