When Donald Trump was elected U.S. president on November 9, 2016, the world was stunned and world leaders were baffled by his unorthodox use of Twitter to bypass traditional media channels. Many chancelleries had hoped he would use the official @POTUS Twitter account rather than his personal campaign Twitter account (@realDonaldTrump) once he was inaugurated.
When he took office, the @realDonaldTrump account was followed by 97 world leaders on Twitter while 226 world leaders were following the @POTUS account. Today, heads of state and government realize that the @realDonaldTrump account is not going away and, as a result, the @realDonaldTrump handle is now followed by 185 of the 951 world leader accounts and it occupies the fifth position among the most followed accounts by world leaders behind the @WhiteHouse (290), @POTUS (250) the @StateDept (210) and @10DowningStreet (194).