It’s Back To All-Caps S*itposting For Trump, But I Know What’s Eating Him

Trumpty Dumpty is not having a good day today. He’s back to all-caps digital screaming and calling Uncle Joe names. Joe, meanwhile, being a sane person, visited the grave of his good friend John McCain and is graciously observing 9/11. Barack Obama has also posted 9/11 commentary, as former presidents are wont to do. But is Trump joining in this venerable tradition? Oh, puh-leeze.

Trumpty’s all bent out of shape, as you see. But it’s not about immigration. He couldn’t give a rat’s azz about immigration, never did. In fact, he loves illegal immigrant labor. Who do you think works in his hotels? Who did he hire to work construction and then stiff?

No, what has Trumpty upset today is that his enemies at the Wall Street Journal did another piece that is less than laudatory, shall we say, and this time they’re describing how his Truth Social platform is going to hell on a bobsled. That’s what he’s lashing out about. Trumpty Dumpty has a SPAC and its name is DWAC and it’s going SPLAT. You would cry too, if it happened to you. And to add insult to injury, it’s Rupert’s Wall Street Journal that is saying this:

“It’s wildly overvalued…We just haven’t seen anything by way of revenue, users on the platform or anything else,” said Julian Klymochko, who manages a SPAC-focused fund at Accelerate Financial Technologies that doesn’t include Digital World. “It’s extremely difficult to judge how viable this actually is.”

Truth Social has been downloaded about two million times this year, down from roughly four million last year following its February 2022 launch, according to market intelligence firm Sensor Tower. The average monthly number of global visitors to the site has fallen in 2023, according to digital intelligence platform Similarweb. […]

Digital World acknowledges the risks the merger faces. The company has said in regulatory filings that Trump’s legal issues could damage his reputation, distract him from the business or force him to resign as chairman.

Trump Media spokeswoman Shannon Devine declined to comment about Truth Social or the deal. She said The Wall Street Journal’s questions “range from knowingly false absurdities to malicious, defamatory falsehoods.” She didn’t respond when asked what questions contained falsehoods.

Now the Wall Street Journal is firmly in Trump world enemy territory. What is comical about that, is that if any publication in this country is the paper of record with respect to the financial sector, it is the Journal. But now they’ve got the gall to tell the truth about Trump’s problems with his vanity social media platform and so he hates them. Oh, to be a billionaire with the emotional development of a toddler. What must that be like, I wonder?

Plus, Trump shot himself in the foot by going over to Twitter/X to post his mugshot and even the fact that Elon Musk owns the platform now is problematic for Trump, because Truth Social was supposed to be the temple of free speech and then what did Elmo do when he bought the place but let all the Nazis and conspiracy theorists back on?

“Elon buying Twitter, reopening it, and taking on some of the censorship concerns that conservatives had with the platform took all of the wind out of the sails of the idea that a new platform is necessary,” Starboard CEO Ryan Coyne said.

And here’s the inside dirt which I think is being referred to as defamatory. Umm…excuse me? The truth is an absolute defense to defamation. It’s not libel or slander if its true.

The deal’s prospects started running into problems last spring, when Musk proposed taking Twitter private. Shortly afterward, Digital World disclosed it had received subpoenas from the Securities and Exchange Commission and federal investigators.

The SEC investigation focused on whether Digital World CEO Patrick Orlando had premature discussions with Trump Media about a possible deal that weren’t disclosed to investors. Such talks would violate SEC rules.

In March, Digital World fired Orlando as CEO but kept him on the company’s board. A few months later, federal prosecutors charged one of its board members and two investors with securities fraud, alleging they made $22 million around the time of the deal announcement and tipped off friends and family about the merger.

In July, the SEC settled fraud charges with the SPAC about Orlando’s premature discussions with Trump’s company and what it called material misrepresentations by the company in previous regulatory filings. If the deal closes, Digital World agreed to pay an $18 million penalty and amend its filings to reflect the accurate history of deal talks.

Devine didn’t respond to questions about the merger talks and Digital World insider-trading charges. The Digital World board member who was charged resigned from Digital World’s board in June 2022.

It’s nice that they settled the fraud charges to the tune of $18MM but they’re far from out of the woods. A new auditor came on board August 9, to replace the one that suddenly and unceremoniously quit and that person will have to put the paperwork in order to satisfy the SEC.

And assuming that the paperwork is all in order and proper, then there’s the fact that Truth Social simply is not worth that much and the chances of that getting turned around are not high.

Plus, now there’s another X account, Donald Trump’s Daily Posts From Truth Social and so people can see what Trump’s doing on X, without having to go to Truth Social. From what I can gather, the hardcore Trump lovers are following the X account. Maybe they’re following the Truth Social account as well, but why bother going two places for the same content, especially when the rest of the action is on X?

Truth Social and Digital World did get an extension to keep putting their deal together, until September 8, 2024 and all that might mean is that the place will blow up right before election day. Great. Nothing like bad publicity 60 days before people go to the polls.

Trump’s going to have to keep grifting off the MAGAs because no big bucks look to be coming from Truth Social. I wonder what Devin’s going to do when it goes bust? Run for Congress again?