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Johannesburg - Twitter followers of Former US President Barack Obama unwittingly ended up following current US President Donald Trump during migration of the @POTUS account.
The President of the United States Twitter profile (@POTUS) is the official account run by the incumbent President’s administration.
Migration of the account took place on President Trump’s Inauguration Day with the tweets from the Obama administration being archived into a new @POTUS44 account.
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Twitter CEO and co-founder Jack Dorsey tweeted shortly before the migration that the users following Obama would also being following Trump.
“If you were following @POTUS before 12pET, by end of day you'd be following *two* accounts: @POTUS44 (44th Admin) and @POTUS (45th Admin),” Dorsey said in his tweet.
Dorsey went further to say that some users who unfollowed @POTUS in the past were mistakenly marked to now follow @POTUS.
The issue is believed to have affected about 560 000 Twitter users.
“This was a mistake, it wasn't right, we own it, and we apologise. No excuses,” Dorsey said in a follow-up tweet.
“We believe we've corrected all accounts to reflect your follow/unfollow intent. We're sorry for the mistakes made here, and thank you all,” he went further to say.
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Both @POTUS44 and now @FLOTUS44 (former account of Michelle Obama’s First Lady of the United States) will now serve as archives of the Obama Administration accounts maintained by the US National Archives and Records Administration.
Michelle Obama last tweet on the archived account read: “Being your First Lady has been the honor of a lifetime. From the bottom of my heart, thank you. –mo,” while her new @MichelleObama account was set up.
Meanwhile, President Trump’s @POTUS account bio read “45th @POTUS @realDonaldTrump. Working on behalf of the American people to make our country great again.”
The account will be run by Dan Scavino Jr., Trump’s assistant and director of social media, while the @FLOTUS account will now be run by Melania Trump’s Office.
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