Sanjana Varghese
Dec 29, 2020
Niall Carson/PA Wire
Donald Trump’s had an eventful year, to say the least – the last year of his presidency was marked by a pandemic and widespread social unrest.
Now, even as he battles to keep his role as the president for another year, it’s become obvious that his time in the spotlight may have to come to an end. Yet, one of the many things about Trump that sets him apart from other presidents (of which there is a long list) is his incessant use of social media, often tweeting at all hours of the day and on everything that comes to mind. Trump tweeted 200 times on June 5, 2020, which was one of the days where protests around the US started to erupt over the death of George Floyd and associated unrest around police brutality and violence .
With that in mind, let’s take a look at the 50 most outrageous, bizarre, surprising and strange things that Trump tweeted this year (in no particular order).
50.
Trump tweeted this in June, during the first protests over the killing of George Floyd at the hands of the police. It was later hidden by Twitter because of the violent content associated with it.
49.
Trump targeted a 75 year old protester as ‘antifa’ in one of several tirades.
48.
This definitely isn’t true.
47.
Trump asked when they would open a ‘cold case’ on Joe Scarborough, a former US Representative and TV show host. There’s some more context on the ‘murder’ that Trump is referencing (which has been thoroughly debunked).
46.
Trump’s ‘LIBERATE’ tweets at the beginning of the pandemic, from April, were darkly funny at the time, and just sad in retrospect.
45.
Trump’s tweets on suburban housewives were bizarre and didn’t seem to be backed up by any form of substantial policy making.
44.
The follow up to Trump’s tweet about housewives was this tweet about Bill Maher, which was both needlessly personal and seemed to come out of nowhere.
43.
Trump actively peddled disinformation about mail in ballots ahead of the presidential election in November.
42.
Trump’s statements led to widespread outrage and anger on the behalf of ethicists, scientists and those who had been working around the clock to beat back Covid-19.
41.
He was making these comments in reference to ongoing scandals at the New York Times.
40.
Trump tweeted about Adam Schiff, the lead impeachment manager for the US Senate.
39.
Trump’s suggestion of a boycott is hardly novel.
38.
Trump tweeted a doctored CNN video, which originally had a chyron saying, “Terrified todler [sic] runs from racist baby; racist baby probably a Trump voter."
37.
Trump tweeted a lot during the summer.
36.
This is probably in reference to the growing tide of Republican support for him.
35.
This is part of a conspiracy theory that Biden and his family are part of a crime family.
34.
Trump was spreading misinformation even before the election.
33.
He has made these comparisons between other countries and the US despite the fact that the US is one of the countries with the worst rate numbers and death toll.
32.
Math has never been one of Trump’s strong suits, but this seems like a particularly bad time to get it wrong.
31.
A Trump trademark involves backtracking on things he had already said, including the use of masks - which Trump had frequently mocked.
30.
He said that Black Lives Matter had become a symbol of hate.
29.
He’s never been a huge fan of Barack Obama, before or after he got into office, but this tweet semed to imply that Barack Obama’s presidency definitely made it possible for Trump to become the president.
28.
This was directly after the 2020 November election, with little to no evidence that it was true.
27.
This was also flagged for misinformation.
26.
This was a false claim made in August, but Trump continued to repeat it even after it had been debunked.
25.
Trump downplayed fears over Covid-19 a month before it properly started to spread in the US.
24.
Before the election results had been returned, Trump tweeted this.
23.
This was tweeted before his infamous looting comments, but it’s awful for other reasons.
22.
Calling one of his former advisers ‘one of the dumbest people in Washington’ is surely a huge self own, but it’s not surprising.
21.
A lot of Trump’s worst tweets this year have been about the coronavirus.
20.
The use of ‘gift’ is particularly annoying here.
19.
Trump has lied about several elements of his government’s Covid response.
18.
This was in reference to Black Lives Matter protests around the world in June.
17.
He spread more misinformation about the spread of Covid-19 in June, when cases were continuing to drop.
16.
Trump has continued to call the coronavirus the “China Virus” several months on.
15.
One of Trump’s sticking points has been his refusal to wear a mask - so it made no sense when he suddenly pivoted to mask wearing as a patriotic act in mid July, months after people had already talked about their effectiveness.
14.
When he made some very incorrect points about vaccines.
13.
This was in a pre election rant, but it seems like a good summary of Trump’s actual policy platforms.
12.
Trump somehow blamed Biden for not being able to handle the ‘swine flu’.
11.
This was about Obama not endorsing Joe Biden, who Trump often calls ‘Sleepy Joe’ but this time he’s called him ‘Slow Joe’. It also shows how little Trump knows about Obama.
10.
This was also about Obama, apparently suggesting that Obama had spied on Trump’s campaign, which was not true and has never been credibly proven.
9.
When he tweeted that the White House doctors had confirmed that he wouldn’t be able to pass on Covid, despite the fact that this hasn’t been confirmed.
8.
Most of his tweets are bizarre because he continues to repeat misinformation.
7.
This claim happens every election and Trump has repeated it - obviously.
6.
Trump trying to take credit for vaccines - developed without any input from him or his administration - again, despite spending months doubting the existence of the coronavius.
5.
When he said he won the election, despite the fact that this wasn’t true.
4.
He called the trending section on Twitter illegal for reasons that are still unclear.
3.
When he claimed that he had done more for black people than Joe Biden.
2.
When he congratulated the National Guard for arriving in Minnesota, where protests had begun after the death of George Floyd, and for keeping the city safe, despite many accounts showing that they escalated violence.
1.
Trump threatened violence against protesters again.
Twitter has confirmed Trump will lose the POTUS handle once he is pushed out of office on January 20th – but it’s unclear whether he’ll hand it over gracefully or have to be pushed out kicking and screaming (our money’s on the latter).
More: What will happen if Trump has to physically vacate White House
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