John Matze, the CEO of social media company Parler, claimed in a new court filing that Donald Trump had not only planned on creating a profile on the app, but also had expressed interest in using a specific username.
According to Business Insider , Matze claimed that despite Trump’s prolific use of personal social media, the president had hoped to remain anonymous on Parler and had even planned on using “Person X” as a pseudonym. However, the platform was shut down before the Art of the Deal author was able to sign up. Parler was unable to remain online after tech giant Amazon decided that it would not continue to host the company on its web service.
Though Amazon claimed that it had decided to sever ties because Parler lacked the ability to properly monitor messages and other content on its platform, Matze and his lawyers argued that Twitter had the same issue yet was not being punished. The argument specifically cited the case of Ashli Babbitt, one of the rioters who was shot at the scene. Babbitt had not used her Parler account since November; in contrast, she was active on Twitter and had even tweeted from her account on the day of the riot.
The filing also argued that the real reason Amazon decided to cut ties with Parler was that the company wanted to deny giving the president any form of communication.
“Based on my interactions with AWS [Amazon Web Services] personnel during this period, I believe AWS’s decision to terminate service to Parler was based, not on expressed concerns about Parler’s compliance with the AWS Agreement, but in part on a desire to deny President Trump a platform on any large social-media service,” the document read, adding that AWS had “inside and confidential” information about Trump’s plans to join the service.
In an attempt to bolster its accusations of a political hit-job, the document further added that the Parler’s liaison at AWS –whose name was redacted — was a Biden-supporter.
“[Redacted], who is a Joe Biden supporter, was AWS’s representative assigned to me by AWS, and was aware since at least October 11, 2020, that Trump was considering moving to Parler under the pseudonym,” the paper read.
News of the out-going president’s alleged desire to join the social networking website comes after he was permanently suspended from Twitter following the riots that rocked Capitol Hill on January 6. As was previously covered by The Inquisitr , the former New York businessman reportedly went “ballistic” upon learning about his ban.