Donald Trump's Tweets Really Matter. These 27 Examples Prove It
President Donald Trump’s critics have long argued whether his tweets are a distraction from the more important policy decisions being made behind the scenes.
But some of Trump’s tweets as president have been just as consequential, if not more so.
In Trump’s first year in office, tweets from @realdonaldtrump have cut the cost of an Air Force contract, undermined White House messaging, forced federal agencies to rebuke them, stoked a congressional investigation, spurred the former director of the FBI to leak a damaging memo, possibly led to the appointment of a special counsel, created new legal trouble for the White House, announced a new military policy to the surprise of the Pentagon, upended a Republican plan to gut an ethics office, nearly derailed two bills the White House backed and been cited by multiple judges ruling against the Administration on several issues.
That seems entirely appropriate, as then-spokesman Sean Spicer said in June that Trump’s tweets are “considered official statements by the President of the United States.”
To be sure, not all of Trump’s tweets have consequences. Some do little more than spur a cable news segment or throw some red meat to his supporters. And others simply repeat the same arguments he’s making at White House events and campaign rallies. But the ones that have mattered have had real-world results.
Here’s a look at some of Trump’s most consequential tweets as president.
Air Force One
Shortly before taking office, Trump tweeted that Boeing’s projected cost for a new Air Force One was “out of control.” “Cancel order!” he wrote. Though not entirely accurate, the tweet sent chills through the defense industry, which feared the president-elect’s bully pulpit, and the U.S. Air Force eventually reduced the price by buying a pair of 747s abandoned by a bankrupt Russian airline.
Boeing is building a brand new 747 Air Force One for future presidents, but costs are out of control, more than $4 billion. Cancel order!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 6, 2016
As with Boeing, similar Trump tweets attacking Lockheed Martin, General Motors and Toyota led the companies’ stock prices to dip immediately, though most recovered after a while, but his criticism of Nordstrom actually led its stock value to climb. When the official White House @potus account retweeted the Nordstrom attack, ethics experts expressed concern, but no action was taken.
Based on the tremendous cost and cost overruns of the Lockheed Martin F-35, I have asked Boeing to price-out a comparable F-18 Super Hornet!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 22, 2016
General Motors is sending Mexican made model of Chevy Cruze to U.S. car dealers-tax free across border. Make in U.S.A.or pay big border tax!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 3, 2017
Toyota Motor said will build a new plant in Baja, Mexico, to build Corolla cars for U.S. NO WAY! Build plant in U.S. or pay big border tax.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 5, 2017
My daughter Ivanka has been treated so unfairly by @Nordstrom. She is a great person -- always pushing me to do the right thing! Terrible!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 8, 2017
Travel ban
The White House repeatedly tried to avoid calling its executive orders restricting entry to the U.S. for citizens of some countries as “travel bans,” in order to avoid legal complications. “This is not a travel ban,” said then-Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly, according to Business Insider. “It’s not a travel ban,” added then-White House spokesman Sean Spicer. Then, early in the morning on June 5, Trump tweeted that it was a travel ban after all.
People, the lawyers and the courts can call it whatever they want, but I am calling it what we need and what it is, a TRAVEL BAN!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 5, 2017
In a second tweet just minutes later, Trump undermined the White House messaging in a different way, calling the second version of the travel ban “watered down,” a remark which opened the door to judges comparing it to the first.
The Justice Dept. should ask for an expedited hearing of the watered down Travel Ban before the Supreme Court - & seek much tougher version!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 5, 2017
Wiretapping
In March, Trump charged that President Barack Obama wiretapped Trump Tower before the 2016 election, calling him a “bad (or sick) guy.” The tweets prompted Obama to issue a rare rebuke of his successor, saying through a spokesman that the claim was “simply false.” The White House and the Republican chairman of a House intelligence committee sought to bolster the unsubstantiated allegation, and eventually the FBI and the Justice Department were forced to declare in court that they have no records of a wiretapping.
Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my "wires tapped" in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 4, 2017
How low has President Obama gone to tapp my phones during the very sacred election process. This is Nixon/Watergate. Bad (or sick) guy!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 4, 2017
James Comey tapes
Frustrated by news accounts of his firing of former FBI director James Comey, Trump intimated in a May tweet that he may have recorded their conversations.
James Comey better hope that there are no "tapes" of our conversations before he starts leaking to the press!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 12, 2017
That led to weeks of speculation over a secret White House taping system, bringing up comparisons with President Richard Nixon. The House Intelligence Committee eventually set a deadline for the White House to clarify whether such tapes existed, and Trump revealed in two subsequent tweets that they did not.
With all of the recently reported electronic surveillance, intercepts, unmasking and illegal leaking of information, I have no idea...
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 22, 2017
...whether there are "tapes" or recordings of my conversations with James Comey, but I did not make, and do not have, any such recordings.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 22, 2017
James Comey memo
The “tapes” tweet also led Comey to leak memos describing his interactions with Trump, as he explained later to the Senate intelligence committee.
“The President tweeted on Friday, after I got fired, that I better hope there’s not tapes,” Comey said. “I woke up in the middle of the night on Monday night, because it didn’t dawn on me originally, that there might be corroboration for our conversation, there might be a tape.”
Comey’s leak led directly to a story in the New York Times on May 16 recounting that Trump asked him to end the investigation into former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn, who later pleaded guilty to misleading federal agents.
Special counsel Robert Mueller
As Comey told the Senate committee, he hoped the leak of his memo would prompt the appointment of a special counsel to look into various legal issues raised by his firing and the Russia investigation.
It’s hard to definitively say whether that happened, because Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein made the decision on his own, but former FBI director Robert Mueller was appointed special counsel on May 17, the day after the Times story on the memo ran.
Michael Flynn and the FBI
After Michael Flynn pleaded guilty in December, Trump tweeted that he had to fire him because he had “lied to the FBI.” That prompted Trump critics to question whether the president knew that Flynn had lied, with some even speculating that it amounted to an admission of obstruction of justice.
I had to fire General Flynn because he lied to the Vice President and the FBI. He has pled guilty to those lies. It is a shame because his actions during the transition were lawful. There was nothing to hide!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 2, 2017
THIS IS OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE. @POTUS now admits he KNEW Michael Flynn lied to the FBI. Yet Trump tried to influence or stop the FBI investigation on #Flynn. https://t.co/8JqGBxgou0
— Ted Lieu (@tedlieu) December 2, 2017
That led Trump’s personal lawyer, John Dowd, to step forward to say that he drafted the tweet, which only raised more questions.
Transgender military recruits
In July, Trump took to Twitter to announce that he would not allow transgender individuals to serve in the military, ending years of high-level discussion on the issue.
After consultation with my Generals and military experts, please be advised that the United States Government will not accept or allow......
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 26, 2017
....Transgender individuals to serve in any capacity in the U.S. Military. Our military must be focused on decisive and overwhelming.....
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 26, 2017
....victory and cannot be burdened with the tremendous medical costs and disruption that transgender in the military would entail. Thank you
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 26, 2017
Top military leaders from all four service branches were reportedly blindsided by the tweets, and members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, including Chairman Gen. Joseph Dunford, were not aware of the decision ahead of time, according to CNN.
Pentagon leaders said the next day that they would not change the policy until they received detailed guidance from the White House on how to implement the tweeted policy change.
In October, a U.S. District Court judge issued a preliminary injunction on the ban and transgender recruits were allowed to enlist starting Jan. 1.
Office of Congressional Ethics, FISA Act, CHIP
A few weeks before taking office in January of 2017, Trump tweeted that Congress should not curtail the Office of Congressional Ethics, just one day after House Republicans had voted to do so. The ensuing uproar led GOP lawmakers to scrap the plan within a day.
With all that Congress has to work on, do they really have to make the weakening of the Independent Ethics Watchdog, as unfair as it
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 3, 2017
........may be, their number one act and priority. Focus on tax reform, healthcare and so many other things of far greater importance! #DTS
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 3, 2017
In January of 2018, Trump took to Twitter to criticize the renewal of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, again citing his unfounded concerns that he was wiretapped by the Obama Administration. There was just one problem: The White House was pushing for the bill.
“House votes on controversial FISA ACT today.” This is the act that may have been used, with the help of the discredited and phony Dossier, to so badly surveil and abuse the Trump Campaign by the previous administration and others?
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 11, 2018
The tweet, which may have been based on a Fox New segment, briefly threw a vote on the bill into chaos, with some in Congress calling for a delay on the bill until the White House position could be clarified. In the end, the vote was held and the bill passed after Trump tweeted a clarification.
With that being said, I have personally directed the fix to the unmasking process since taking office and today’s vote is about foreign surveillance of foreign bad guys on foreign land. We need it! Get smart!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 11, 2018
That happened again later in the month when Trump tweeted that a renewal of the Children’s Health Insurance Program should be part of a “long term solution,” seemingly contradicting the strategy behind Republicans’ continuing resolution, which included long-term funding for the program in an attempt to woo Democratic support.
CHIP should be part of a long term solution, not a 30 Day, or short term, extension!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 18, 2018
Travel ban, transgender recruits, DACA
The travel ban faced repeated court challenges over its constitutionality, especially because Trump had called on the campaign trail for a ban on Muslims entering the United States, a move that most judges would find violates religious freedom protections.
In a decision blocking the first travel ban, U.S. District Court Judge Derrick Watson cited one of Trump’s tweets about “bad dudes,” saying it should be taken as an official statement by the president.
If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the "bad" would rush into our country during that week. A lot of bad "dudes" out there!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 30, 2017
George Conway, husband of Trump adviser Kellyanne and a one-time candidate for a legal post in the White House, warned that the president’s tweets could come back to haunt him if the case ever went before the Supreme Court.
These tweets may make some ppl feel better, but they certainly won't help OSG get 5 votes in SCOTUS, which is what actually matters. Sad. https://t.co/zVhcyfm8Hr
— George Conway (@gtconway3d) June 5, 2017
Conway was right. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals cited one of Trump’s tweets in a ruling against the second version of the travel ban.
That's right, we need a TRAVEL BAN for certain DANGEROUS countries, not some politically correct term that won't help us protect our people!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 6, 2017
In October, U.S. District Court Judge Theodore D. Chuang also cited Trump’s tweets when ruling against the third version of the travel ban, including the “watered down” tweet, another which cited a fake story about General John J. Pershing and another that mentioned political correctness.
The Justice Dept. should ask for an expedited hearing of the watered down Travel Ban before the Supreme Court - & seek much tougher version!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 5, 2017
The travel ban into the United States should be far larger, tougher and more specific-but stupidly, that would not be politically correct!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 15, 2017
Study what General Pershing of the United States did to terrorists when caught. There was no more Radical Islamic Terror for 35 years!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 17, 2017
During questioning on a case involving the third version of the travel ban in a federal court in December, members of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit also voiced concern about some of Trump’s tweets, including the Pershing tweet and another instance in which Trump retweeted videos about purported Muslim violence from a far right British group.
It’s not just the travel ban either. In October, U.S. District Court Judge Colleen Kollar Kotelly cited Trump’s tweets announcing a ban on transgender individuals from serving in the military in a decision granting a temporary injunction against it.
And in January of 2018, U.S. District Court Judge William Alsup cited Trump’s tweets about the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program in a decision blocking the Administration from phasing it out.
Does anybody really want to throw out good, educated and accomplished young people who have jobs, some serving in the military? Really!.....
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 14, 2017