That didn’t take long. Within 15 minutes of Donald Trump taking the oath of office to become the nation’s 45th president, the official @POTUS Twitter account changed from images of Barack Obama to the new president.
The number of followers on the account initially dropped from 13.7 million at 10:30 a.m. ET to 3.6 million at 12:15 p.m.
But a spokesperson for the social media giant told TheWrap on Friday that the transfer of all of the old account’s followers to the new destination would take a a few hours and would be completed by end of day.
Trump issued his first tweet from @POTUS at 2:11 p.m. ET. The new president has indicated that he would continue to use his personal @RealDonaldTrump handle — and resumed tweeting to that account within an hour of being sworn in.
#InaugurationDay Speech??https://t.co/2h8yWMYQz9 pic.twitter.com/Q9u8n9vez2
— President Trump 45 Archived (@POTUS45) January 20, 2017
As a media star and candidate, Trump has been an avid Twitter user, frequently using the social media platform to voice his opinions and attack critics.
His private account, @RealDonaldTrump, currently has 20.6 million followers.
Barack Obama’s old POTUS account, including all his tweets as president, has been archived at a new Twitter handle, @POTUS44, which has 13.8 million followers. (His Organizing for Action staff also maintain another official account, @BarackObama.)
Trump’s spokeswoman did not immediately respond to TheWrap’s request for comment.
As TheWrap previously reported, Trump has indicated that he will also keep running his personal account.
On Friday, he resumed tweeting on his old account within an hour of being sworn in.
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/822501803615014918
“@realDonaldTrump I think, I’ll keep it,” he said. “So I’ve got 46 million people right now — that’s a lot, that’s really a lot — but 46 million — including Facebook, Twitter and ya know, Instagram, so when you think that you’re 46 million there, I’d rather just let that build up and just keep it @realDonaldTrump, it’s working.”
When President Obama created the @POTUS handle, it was publicly noted that he would pass the handle on to future presidents.
