“Trump’s long Twitter time-out has quite effectively pushed him out of the media spotlight,” says Jill Filipovic at CNN. When Trump could Twitter-bomb his enemies, “he owned the news cycle.” His “unapologetic bigotry sent the left reeling and created a culture of permissiveness on the right.” Twitter helped him keep any Republicans unhappy with his “antics” or policies too afraid to challenge him.

Trump has said he plans to focus on Truth Social and wouldn’t return to Twitter. “But it’s hard to imagine a man with such itchy Twitter fingers” staying away for long if Musk invites him back. In 2024, “four years of boring competence,” along with “a rough economy and rising consumer prices,” will overshadow the memory of four years of “chaos and ineptitude” under Trump. He’ll need to “motivate and win over” people who have tuned out politics since he left office. Reclaiming his most effective soapbox “might just be his path to victory.”