The administration does not consider Twitter a vital part of any political strategy that reaches beyond the chattering classes. One former White House official told Semafor the platform is an “afterthought” in communications and press meetings, which tend to focus first on television and traditional media and on Facebook, a declining service that still reaches a mass audience. …
The disdain for Twitter inside the White House has little to do with right-wing control of the platform, and more to do with its role inside the Democratic Party: Biden’s wing sees Twitter as fuel for activist voices who push ingroup thinking, left-of-center bias, and socioeconomic bias.
When Biden ran for president in 2016, his staff’s mantra was “Twitter isn’t real life.” Now, aides point to data from The New York Times suggesting that Democrats are “more moderate, more diverse and less educated” than those on the social media platform.
[If true, this is a pretty smart approach. However, Biden’s decision to go all-in on a progressive agenda his first two years — and stubborn refusal to triangulate out of it and into the centrist course he promised — suggests that the Biden White House lives more in the Twitterverse than they’re pretending. — Ed]
Join the conversation as a VIP Member