Donald Trump won the presidential debate because eight people sent supportive tweets, campaign suggests

One of the posts was just a picture of a baby

Republican U.S. presidential nominee Donald Trump waves as he is greeted by his wife Melania (L) after the conclusion of the third and final debate with Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton at UNLV in Las Vegas, Nevada (REUTERS/Rick Wilking)

Donald Trump is the “clear winner” of the final debate, according to eight Twitter users arbitrarily chosen by Donald Trump.

The candidate’s campaign made the claim apparently on the basis of eight tweets that were sent to his official account showing support for him.

Many of the tweets didn’t even reference Mr Trump’s performance in the debate, and three of them were sent even before the debate had began.

The presidential candidate posted a blogpost soon after the debate finished under the title “Battleground Voters Sound Off And Donald Trump is The Clear Winner”. The rest of the post continued to pick tweets from various important states – Florida, North Carolina and Pennsylvania – posting between one and five from each state.

In all there were only eight tweets. Many of them were either posted before the debate or made no comment on it – one included just a picture of a baby that was apparently preparing to watch the debate.

That was the most shared of the tweets, with 15 retweets. Many of them were retweeted only once or twice.

All of them were sent to his official account. Mr Trump has spoken repeatedly of the power of his social media following, saying that he was "not unproud" of his sometimes bizarre behaviour on the service.

Official polls showed Hillary Clinton winning the debate and extending her lead over Mr Trump.