Senior White House staffers were “relieved” and “quite frankly amazed” that President Trump managed to stay away from Twitter during James Comey’s Senate testimony, according to the Daily Beast.
Trump didn’t tweet during Comey’s testimony, despite being called a liar. However, Donald Trump Jr. and a variety of Trump’s media allies attacked Comey via the president’s favorite social media platform.
“I just hope the lesson sinks in,” a senior administration official told The Daily Beast. “You have your attack dogs. Let them do their thing. Not everything has to be live-tweeted.”
“Legitimately surprised. Impressed. Great. Hallelujah,” a senior aide told the Daily Beast of Trump’s ability to stay off Twitter on Thursday. “I feel like I can finally exhale. The stakes here were massive, and it went about as well as it could’ve.”
Trump’s longtime personal lawyer, Marc Kasowitz, delivered a televised rebuttal of Comey’s testimony, saying, “the president never pressured Mr. Comey” and he “feels completely vindicated.”
Trump went MIA on Twitter for nearly 46 hours, the longest social-media silence since his inauguration on January 20. He finally broke his Twitter silence early Friday morning with a slam on “leaker” Comey for “so many false statements and lies.”
But that came after a record 45 hours, 53 minutes after his previous tweet, a preview of his trip to Cincinnati to discuss “Healthcare & also Infrastructure” that went out on Wednesday at 8:17 a.m. ET — more than a day before Comey made his appearance on Capitol Hill.
The longest previous social-media dry spell lasted 39 hours, 37 minutes — from 4:41 p.m. on April 14 to 8:18 a.m. on Easter Sunday, April 16 — not counting a retweet of wife Melania Trump touting the White House Easter Egg Roll sent around 4:46 p.m., according to the Trump Twitter archive.