Accounts supporting Donald Trump and the MAGA movement on X/Twitter, previously thought to be based in the US, have been revealed to originate from Eastern Europe and other regions.
Following Elon Musk’s acquisition of Twitter in October 2022, a surge of engagement farming profiles emerged on the platform, aiming to profit from viral posts. This influx of anonymous accounts sharing pro-Trump and MAGA content led to suspicions that they were not US-based.
To earn money from their posts, users on the platform must actively monetize their content and possess an XPremium subscription. While Musk intended this approach to combat bots on the platform, it inadvertently incentivized accounts outside the US to generate controversy or cater to specific groups to boost their earnings.
Several accounts, such as one impersonating White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt’s husband, Nicholas, claimed to be American but were actually based in non-EU Eastern European countries. Similarly, accounts like AmericanPatriot and Fan Trump Army, with substantial followings, were found to operate from locations like Chile and south Asia, respectively.
Even conservative influencers using Trump family members’ names and images were discovered to be originating from outside the US. For example, the account Barron Trump News, with a significant following, was traced back to Eastern Europe.
In response to these revelations, Nikita Bier, X/Twitter’s head of product, announced plans to introduce a feature displaying the country or region where an account is located. This move was praised for enhancing transparency and providing users with more information about the accounts they follow.
Furthermore, accounts supporting different political ideologies, such as pro-Democrat profiles from Africa and pro-Israel accounts from India, were also identified as being based in regions outside their purported locations.