“Modern Day Presidential:" Donald Trump and American Politics in the Age of Twitter

Abstract

The increasing power of social media over American news and politics is difficult to ignore thanks to the visibility of President Trump’s tweets both on online and traditional media. This paper seeks to better understand the strategy behind Donald Trump’s use of Twitter both as a candidate and during his first year as president. Through a careful study of his tweets and their ability to take advantage of the specific user makeup on Twitter and the choice of mainstream media to often echo his tweets in their coverage, a consistent strategy emerges based on a combination of traditional advertising practice and radicalist discourse that continues to reshape the American political landscape today.