President Donald Trump slammed Twitter Thursday as #TrumpMeltdown trended on the microblogging platform, falsely insisting that the trending topics on the site are determined by anti-Republican bias among executives.
“It’s never a real Twitter Trending. It’s Twitter Executive’s Choice. Only negative on Republican voices, especially mine!” the president tweeted.
A Twitter spokesperson refuted that characterization in a statement to TheWrap: “Trends are determined by an algorithm and, by default, are tailored for you based on who you follow, your interests, and location.”
The trend was sparked after Trump responded in real-time to former President Barack Obama’s Wednesday night speech at the Democratic National Convention, where Obama’s former Vic President Joe Biden was formally nominated as the party’s presidential candidate.
As the speech went on, Trump tweeted several times, in all caps, about his predecessor, who took numerous direct shots at Trump during the speech. Trump, seemingly not happy about those insults coming his way, took his complaints to his 84 million followers.
“HE SPIED ON MY CAMPAIGN, AND GOT CAUGHT!” wrote Trump, referencing his oft-repeated and false claim that Obama and his administration engaged in spying during the 2016 campaign.
He went on, tweeting, “WHY DID HE REFUSE TO ENDORSE SLOW JOE UNTIL IT WAS ALL OVER, AND EVEN THEN WAS VERY LATE? WHY DID HE TRY TO GET HIM NOT TO RUN?”
In American politics, former presidents typically do not endorse anyone in their own party’s presidential primary, because such an endorsement would hold too much sway.
Of Biden’s running mate Sen. Kamala Harris, Trump tweeted, “BUT DIDN’T SHE CALL HIM A RACIST??? DIDN’T SHE SAY HE WAS INCOMPETENT???”
He was referring to a moment during one of the primary debates in which Harris specifically said that she did not think Biden was a racist. Conservatives have been regularly claiming Harris said the opposite.
The onslaught of all-caps tweets led the hashtag #TrumpMeltdown to trend well into Thursday morning.