[Op-Ed] Trump’s Plan To Sell Truth Social Posts Is Corrupt

A large crowd of people gathered at an outdoor event, with flags and banners visible. The text "Beyond the skies and the ocean" is displayed on a banner in the foreground. — Source: Truth Social / Screenshot

A lawsuit was filed on Wednesday in a New York court over President Donald Trump’s plan to sell early access to his Truth Social posts for $100,000 a month.

The New York Times reports that Freedom of the Press Foundation and The Intercept filed the lawsuit. The suit argues that Trump “stands to gain financially by giving ‘market-moving’ government information to those who are willing and able to pay his personal company.” The suit found that Trump has posted thousands of times on Truth Social since taking office, with no official White House correspondence following up on those posts. The suit argues that this means “President Trump’s posts are the only way to get official government news.”

The suit also argues that the First Amendment “guarantees equal access to the President’s public announcements,” with any restriction on equal access to public information needing to “serve a legitimate governmental purpose.” Think sensitive national security data or information about an ongoing federal investigation. The suit argues that selling early access to Trump’s posts to private buyers is not a legitimate governmental purpose.

As someone who works for a city government, I can tell you that this is a genuine argument. I do digital content creation for a parks and recreation department, and we legally cannot delete our comments, the public’s comments, our content, or even block people who repeatedly harass the city’s accounts over First Amendment concerns. I cannot tell you how many monthly department meetings I’ve been in where this point has been stressed ad nauseam.

Mind you, I make silly videos celebrating public parks and encouraging folks to get a library card (which you really should do; you’d be surprised how many resources you can access with a library card). So a sitting president trying to paywall access to what is ostensibly public information should have been a nonstarter off rip.

Of course, when has Trump ever cared about rules and norms?

Historically speaking, a sitting president blatantly profiting from his position has been frowned upon. Trump clearly didn’t get that memo, as he’s spent most of his second term lining his bank account. Since taking office last year, Trump has made a whopping $2.4 billion, tripling his income from the year before.

I wish someone would pay me billions of dollars for being bad at my job. Oh, to be an old, weird, white man who allegedly craps his pants.

Much of this money has come from cryptocurrency, as well as through a genuinely staggering amount of stock trades. Trump has made over 21,000 securities trades since taking office. Comparatively, former President Joe Biden made only 13 trades during his presidency.

It’s clear that the Truth Social plan is just another of Trump’s many attempts to profit off his position of power, but that didn’t stop Truth Social from acting like they’re the real victims in this scenario. A spokesperson for the company released a statement addressing the lawsuit, saying, “left-wing activists are trying to wrongly weaponize the courts to censor” Trump and harm the company’s shareholders.

I mean, aren’t y’all kinda censoring the president by placing his posts behind a paywall? You know what, I’m gonna stop asking questions.