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Tuesday, June 13, 2017

Covfefe bill aims to stop Trump deleting presidential tweets

Donald Trump is facing action aimed at preventing him deleting his tweets - in a bill named after his infamous "covfefe" post.

The Communications Over Various Feeds Electronically for Engagement or COVFEFE bill was introduced to the US House of Representatives on Monday.

Mike Quigley, a Democratic congressman from Illinois, presented the proposed legislation as a means of making the US President accountable for every social media post he makes.

The bill hopes to amend the Presidential Record Act to ensure Mr Trump's Twitter posts are archived as part of the official record of his time in office.

It would also make the deletion of posts a violation of the presidential record.
Mr Trump has regularly deleted his tweets since taking office, leading to the creation of a number of websites keeping a record of his erased posts.

The US President, who has tweeted more than 35,000 times since joining Twitter in 2009, recently sparked worldwide bemusement by posting the word "covfefe".

In a tweet that stayed online for hours before he deleted it, Mr Trump wrote: "Despite the constant negative press covfefe"

Following huge speculation - and mockery - at what his likely typo was meant to say, the US President wrote: "Who can figure out the true meaning of "covfefe" ??? Enjoy!"


The White House press secretary Sean Spicer refused to admit the President had made a typo, telling reporters "the president and a small group of people know exactly what he meant".

Mr Trump's fondness for tweeting about his policies backfired on him this week.

Judges cited one of his posts within their reasoning for upholding a decision to block his travel ban on certain Muslim-majority countries.

Commenting on his COVFEFE act, Mr Quigley said: "In order to maintain public trust in government, elected officials must answer for what they do and say; this includes 140-character tweets.

"If the President is going to take to social media to make sudden public policy proclamations, we must ensure that these statements are documented and preserved for future reference.

"Tweets are powerful, and the President must be held accountable for every post."

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