Elon Musk suggests new name for Trump’s Truth Social app as he accuses Twitter of censorship

Telsa boss suggested former president’s app should be called ‘Trumpet’

Elon Musk has suggested a new name for Donald Trump’s Truth Social app as he accused Twitter, which he has just agreed to buy for $44bn, of censorship.

The Tesla boss, whose takeover of the San Francisco-based platform was announced earlier this week, took to Twitter to compare it to to the former president’s own social media company.

“Truth Social (terrible name) exists because Twitter censored free speech,” Mr Musk tweeted.

“Should be called Trumpet instead!”

Mr Musk brought up Mr Trump’s social media project as he pointed out that Truth Social was above both Twitter and TikTok on the Apple Store.

The South African-born billionaire’s prospective purchase of Twitter for $54.20 per share in cash has seen him publicly push the notion of free speech being denied by Twitter.

That has led his critics to suggest that banned right-wing figures, such as Mr Trump and Marjorie Taylor Greene, would be allowed back on the platform after the current regime suspended their accounts.

Mr Trump told Fox News earlier this week that he had no intentions of returning to Twitter, regardless if it was bought by Mr Musk.

“I am not going on Twitter, I am going to stay on TRUTH. I hope Elon buys Twitter because he’ll make improvements to it and he is a good man, but I am going to be staying on TRUTH,” he said.

The Trump Media & Technology Group social media platform formally launched in March, and after beta-testing it is now live on its new cloud services.

“We’re taking in millions of people, and what we’re finding is that the response on TRUTH is much better than being on Twitter,” Mr Trump said. “Twitter has bots and fake accounts, and we are doing everything we can.”

And he added: “The bottom line is, no, I am not going back to Twitter.”

Mr Trump was suspended from Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and Snapchat following the 6 January US Capitol riot, in which his supporters tried to violently prevent the certification of Joe Biden’s election victory.