Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey will step down

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey is stepping down, the company announced on Monday, teeing up a major shift for a social media platform that has played an outsize role in politics and the power struggle between Silicon Valley and Washington.

Dorsey, who co-founded the company in 2006, has signed off on most of Twitter's most politically potent moves over the past six years ― including its decision in January to permanently boot then-President Donald Trump. His replacement as CEO will be Parag Agrawal, who has been its chief technology officer since 2017.

Twitter’s stock jumped 10 percent in premarket trading on early news that Dorsey would leave. Agrawal assumed his new role as CEO on Monday.

"I've decided to leave Twitter because I believe the company is ready to move on from its founders," Dorsey said in a statement. "My trust in Parag as Twitter's CEO is deep. His work over the past 10 years has been transformational. I'm deeply grateful for his skill, heart, and soul. It's his time to lead."

Dorsey’s politicized tenure: Dorsey has testified on Capitol Hill five times since resuming the helm of Twitter in 2015, raising eyebrows with his nonchalant and unapologetic approach to lawmakers’ questioning. He even trolled Congress in a tweet while he testified during a hearing about online misinformation in March.

Twitter under his leadership has taken a series of controversial steps to combat political misinformation and hate speech — including kicking Trump off the platform over his role in cheering the attack on the Capitol on Jan. 6. Twitter had previously banned all political ads, ramping up pressure on its much larger competitor Facebook to tighten its policing of the political messages it allows.

Dorsey used his final note to Twitter employees on Monday to take a thinly veiled swipe at Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, who is the last of the big tech company founder CEOs to retain his position.

"There aren't many founders that choose their company over their own ego," Dorsey said. "I know we'll prove this was the right move."

What comes next: Twitter, which is much smaller than its big tech rivals, has escaped much of the trust-busting scrutiny that Washington has aimed at Google, Facebook, Amazon and Apple. But it will likely continue to face enormous scrutiny from conservatives, who contend that the company censors right-wing voices, and Democrats, who have taken aim at the platform for allowing the spread of misinformation and hate speech.

Agrawal in a statement said he looks forward to "building on everything we have accomplished under Jack's leadership."

"By continuing to improve our execution, we will deliver tremendous value for our customers and shareholders as we reshape the future of public conversation," Agrawal said.