Ivanka Trump, Don Jr and Tiffany see boost in Twitter followers after their father's account was banned
When Twitter banned former President Donald Trump from its platform for his involvement in inciting a mob to barge into the US Capitol leading to riots that killed five people, it left millions of his followers in a fix. These followers seem to have flocked over to Trump's children as they see a massive boost in their Twitter followers since President Joe Biden's inauguration.
The social media giant had banned Trump 12 days before the inauguration on January 8, in light of his tweets provoking a mob. His actions were deemed to pose "the risk of further incitement of violence". He was also blocked or restricted on Facebook, Instagram and YouTube.
Following his ban came the rise in alternative social networking apps such as Parler, which saw a massive footfall of conservatives and Trump's MAGA supporters. But that didn't last long either. Google and Apple removed the app from their app stores the very next day on January 9, saying Parler has "not taken adequate measures to address the proliferation of" threats of 'violence and illegal activity' to people’s safety.
Since Trump and Melania's exit from the White House, Ivanka Trump, Tiffany Trump, and Donald Trump Jr have all acquired thousands of new followers. According to social media tracking firm Social Blade, between January 20, 2021, the day of President Biden's inauguration, and January 26, 2021, Donald Trump Jr gained more than 46,100 followers, Ivanka Trump gained more than 27,100 followers and Tiffany Trump gained over 5,100.
While all of them gained a decent number of followers, only Eric Trump's account was reported to lose the count. According to statistics from the social media tracking firm Social Blade, Eric's follower count had dropped for 16 consecutive days, a downward trajectory in which he lost more than 302,500 followers between January 7, 2021, a day after the riots, and January 22, 2021.
Three days after the riots, Ivanka Trump, Donald Trump Jr and Tiffany Trump collectively lost more than 98,000 followers, with tens of thousands more accounts continuing to vanish from their profiles over the next week, Social Blade analytics suggest. This decrease was a part of Twitter's clean-up drive of its site off QAnon-associated content, which saw tens of thousands of accounts suspended starting on January 8.
"These accounts were engaged in sharing harmful QAnon-associated content at scale and were primarily dedicated to the propagation of this conspiracy theory across the service," Twitter said in a blog post published on January 12. "Our updated enforcement on QAnon content along with routine spam challenges has resulted in changes in follower count for some people's Twitter accounts. In some cases these actions may have resulted in follower count changes in the thousands."
According to data gathered by Social Blade, Ivanka stands at 10.3 million followers, Donald Trump Jr is at 6.6 million and Tiffany Trump has fewer than 1 million Twitter followers, at more than 886,800. The site reports that even Trump's youngest daughter's numbers are falling.
In this purge were also included the likes of Florida representative Matt Gaetz and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo who complained of losing followers.