President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris have recently become associated with Meta's Threads app, which is in competition with Elon Musk's X. During the past seven days, representatives of the White House have censured Musk for his so-called “anti-semitic language” on X. In an emailed press release to CNBC, the White House mentioned that the commencement of the Threads accounts had been organized for several weeks.
On Monday, the White House created accounts for President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, the first lady and second gentleman, and The White House itself on Threads, a rival to Elon Musk's X. Within an hour of launching Biden's account, it had gained 2 million followers. This move comes after Musk, with his listed 163 million followers, called an antisemitic conspiracy theory "the actual truth" on X and asserted that some "Jewish communities" promote "anti-white" messaging and views, singling out the Anti-Defamation League and minorities. Consequently, White House officials denounced Musk for these statements. Apple, Disney and other major advertisers then suspended their spending on X. Musk defended his comments on Sunday but did not apologize or take back his statements. Threads was launched in July as an alternative to X and was met with immediate success, racking up more than 100 million signups in the middle of that month. Apptopia estimated in October that Threads had around 33 million daily active users in the U.S. Adam Mosseri, head of Instagram at Meta, has stated Threads shall not prioritize political or news-related posts, yet many former Twitter users have shifted to Threads to stay up to date on news. The White House said in a statement that creating the Threads accounts had been in the works for weeks, and that they are "committed to meeting people where they are." Biden posted his first messaged on the app, expressing optimism for the future of America.
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