Trump news: Trump returns to Twitter and formally demands Facebook reinstatement

While Donald Trump was granted access to his Twitter account back on 19 November following the takeover of the company by Elon Musk and the decision to reverse the ban imposed on the former president in the wake of the Capitol riot, he has to tweet.

That could all change according to reporting by NBC News, which states that his 2024 campaign advisers have been workshopping ideas for his first tweet.

In addition, the campaign has also approached Facebook parent Meta to unblock his account on that platform which was also suspended two years ago.

“We believe that the ban on President Trump’s account on Facebook has dramatically distorted and inhibited the public discourse,” Trump’s campaign wrote in its letter to Meta on Tuesday, according to a copy reviewed by NBC News.

The campaign would like a meeting to discuss reinstatement. Meta has said it will announce a decision in the coming weeks.

Since his ban from the principal social media platforms, Mr Trump founded his own — Truth Social — but does not enjoy the audience and bully pulpit he had on the other sites. While he has 4.8 million followers on Truth Social, he had 88 million on Twitter and 34 million on Facebook.

Another day, another George Santos headline. Several of them, actually.

Eric Garcia explains why Kevin McCarthy – let alone the rest of GOP leadership – likely can’t afford to quit Mr Santos for one simple reason.

Donald Trump’s former lawyer, Michael Cohen, said he met for 2½ hours Tuesday with Manhattan prosecutors who have revived a years-old investigation into payments made to a porn star to keep her quiet about an alleged extramarital tryst.

Cohen said he had been “ordered not to disclose” any of the people present at the meeting or to discuss prosecutors’ area of interest in any detail.

Republican Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy has repeated his intention to keep Democratic representatives Eric Swalwell, Adam Schiff, and Ilhan Omar off the House intelligence committee. The move is widely seen as revenge for Democrats removing Republicans Marjorie Taylor Greene and Paul Gosar. It is also, though, a reiteration of Republican commitment to government by trolling.

In a busy day of Truth Social posts, former president Donald Trump wonders:

Why aren’t they asking President Obama what’s going on with his Administration? Crooked Hillary took and illegally deleted and acid washed 33,000 Emails AFTER getting a Subpoena for those Emails from the United States Congress, and who knows how many Classified Documents Joe took, especially pertaining to Ukraine and China. Maybe Trump Hating Special “Prosecutor” Jack Smith, who is doing the dirty work for his Marxist Democrat friends, should do the right thing for our Country!

He adds in a follow-up post:

Our Country has become the Investigation Capital of the World. Actually, that’s all we do, and it’s only good for our many enemies. They could not be happier as they brilliantly plot our demise!!!

Donald Trump insisted on Wednesday in posts on Truth Social that many of the documents marked “classified” found at Mar-a-Lago — of more than 300 in total — were in fact empty folders marked “classified” that he had taken as “cool” keepsakes.

Mr Trump went on to reiterate his baseless accusation claiming that federal law enforcement agents would plant more classified documents among the seized materials in order to further incriminate him.

John Bowden has the details.

Jared Kushner warned Donald Trump against listening to the outside lawyers he’d gathered around himself during his attempt to overturn the 2020 election, telling his father-in-law that his legal team was sending him on “a funky ride”.

In his new book on the first two years of Joe Biden’s presidency, The Fight of his Life, author Chris Whipple writes that Mr Kushner “chose to make himself scarce” in the days leading up to the January 6 attack on the Capitol because he “knew there was nothing there” when it came to Mr Trump’s claims to be the victim of a stolen election.

Andrew Feinberg reports from Washington, DC.

Donald Trump has been captured on video awkwardly avoiding a high five after taking a photo with a group of supporters during what appears to be a round of golf at his private Florida club.

Lawyer Ron Filipkowski shared the footage on Twitter, in which the former president smiles for the camera and gives a thumbs up before climbing back into his golf cart, without high-fiving the supporter next to him, whose arm is grabbed by a man, preventing him from touching Mr Trump.

Gustaf Kilander has the story.

Donald Trump has announced that he will preside over the memorial service for Diamond of the political vlogging duo Diamond and Silk.

“They were with me from the beginning and they never wavered,” Mr Trump said.

A former acquaintance of Congressman George Santos appeared on CNN on Tuesday and delivered the latest round of seemingly unending allegations of dishonesty piling up around the freshman Republican from New York.

Gregory Morey-Parker claimed that the Republican representative would use a false last name on some GoFundMe campaigns in an effort to pass off as Jewish, which Mr Morey-Parker explained was part of a scheme to entice Jewish Americans to donate to the campaigns.

John Bowden filed this report.