“House of Cards” creator Beau Willimon is asking Twitter to remove Donald Trump’s accounts following his latest “tantrum.”
“Today’s tantrum is just the latest example of why @realDonaldTrump & @POTUS must be removed from @Twitter. Here’s my full argument…,” Willimon tweeted Saturday before going on a 16-tweet rant.
He went on to explain that “what the President tweets has real and significant impact on the business of governance, world affairs and national security” — but that Trump has “consistently made misleading claims, attacked the judiciary and threatened sovereign states, the press & the public.”
Willimon added that Trump has violated various Twitter rules by posting violent threats, harassment and “hateful conduct.”
“Today’s outburst is broadcasting to foreign leaders his continuing impulsiveness, recklessness, delusion & ignorance about gov’t,” read one tweet. “That makes @RealDonaldTrump‘s tweets a national security threat. It emboldens our enemies to take advantage of his flagrant shortcomings.”
Willimon concluded his Twitter spree saying that while we can’t stop the president from tweeting “reckless things,” Twitter should not be giving him a platform to do so.
Willimon has been outspoken ab0out Trump in the past. In January, he told TheWrap’s Editor-in-Chief Sharon Waxman and Anna Palmer, co-author of Politico’s Playbook daily newsletter: “We have always moved forward, slowly, with difficulty, with pain, with death. And we have had times where we have moved backwards. We saw it in Reconstruction. We saw it in the Jim Crow era after the 13th Amendment was passed. There are times we moved backward. But we always end up in the long term moving forward, improving, involving, and perfecting our democracy. We’ve moved backward right now… but in the long story that is America we will overcome that, we will move beyond that, and our country will be a better place.”
Read his entire spree below.
1. Today's tantrum is just the latest example of why @realDonaldTrump & @POTUS must be removed from @Twitter. Here's my full argument…
— Beau Willimon (@BeauWillimon) March 4, 2017
2. Only one person on @Twitter is President of the United States. That comes with a supreme and unique responsibility unlike any other user.
— Beau Willimon (@BeauWillimon) March 4, 2017
3. What the President tweets has real and significant impact on the business of governance, world affairs and national security.
— Beau Willimon (@BeauWillimon) March 4, 2017
4. President Trump has consistently made misleading claims, attacked the judiciary and threatened sovereign states, the press & public.
— Beau Willimon (@BeauWillimon) March 4, 2017
5. His tweets recklessly bypass diplomatic channels without consultation from the State Department, IC or the Pentagon.
— Beau Willimon (@BeauWillimon) March 4, 2017
6. Even as a private citizen it is arguable that he has violated Twitter rules regarding violent threats, harassment and hateful conduct.
— Beau Willimon (@BeauWillimon) March 4, 2017
7. Certainly in the unique position of @POTUS the repercussions and intimations his tweets cross these lines.
— Beau Willimon (@BeauWillimon) March 4, 2017
8. Today's outburst is broadcasting to foreign leaders his continuing impulsiveness, recklessness, delusion & ignorance about gov't.
— Beau Willimon (@BeauWillimon) March 4, 2017
9. That makes @RealDonaldTrump's tweets a national security threat. It emboldens our enemies to take advantage of his flagrant shortcomings.
— Beau Willimon (@BeauWillimon) March 4, 2017
10. For those who would argue that the removal of his account is a violation of free speech, consider this…
— Beau Willimon (@BeauWillimon) March 4, 2017
11. The WH has retaliated against the press by selectively locking them out, called them "the enemy of the people" & ignored hard questions.
— Beau Willimon (@BeauWillimon) March 4, 2017
12. But with his behavior on this service, Trump makes the argument for himself being a liability to the people.
— Beau Willimon (@BeauWillimon) March 4, 2017
13. The President is free to say whatever he wants, and has many of ways of doing so, but no private company owes him an outlet.
— Beau Willimon (@BeauWillimon) March 4, 2017
14. While you cannot prevent the President from saying reckless things elsewhere, @Twitter is not obligated to facilitate that here.
— Beau Willimon (@BeauWillimon) March 4, 2017
15. In fact, with your worldwide reach & impact on the media, you have a duty to steer clear of accounts facilitating nat'l security threats
— Beau Willimon (@BeauWillimon) March 4, 2017
16. @Twitter is amazing. It connects the world. That comes with its own responsibility: to do your part in protecting that world.
/Thread— Beau Willimon (@BeauWillimon) March 4, 2017