Trump supporters flock to ‘free speech’ social network Parler after US election

Parler has become a beloved social network within 'Team Trump'

Supporters of Donald Trump are flocking to a “free speech” network after a crackdown on comments made by the president and his allies on Twitter and Facebook.   

Parler, which claims to be a censorship free alternative to mainstream social media, was the most downloaded free iPhone app as Twitter placed fact checking labels on all five of the tweets made by Donald Trump.

Its astronomical rise — climbing from the 1,023rd most downloaded app on Monday November 2 — could signal the beginning of a splitting of the internet into political corners.   

Parler appeared in 2018 and has become popular with personalities who have been banned on mainstream websites, like right wing pundits Milo Yiannopolous and Katie Hopkins. Trump’s son Eric his campaign manager Brad Parscale both have accounts.

Former White House adviser Steve Bannon has made Parler his virtual home after Twitter suspended him for condoning the beheading of FBI director Christopher Wray and the US pandemic chief Anthony Fauci last week.   

Steve Bannon exits the Manhattan Federal Court on August 20, 2020 after he was indicted for allegedly defrauding donors in a $25 million border wall fundraising campaign

Mr Bannon is now using the app, which looks similar to Twitter with the ability to follow, like and repost someone’s comment, to dispute the election results.  

Facebook and Twitter, where Mr Trump has 88.9 million followers, have long been targets of the outgoing president and his allies, who accuse the websites of bias against conservative voices. He continues to use Twitter to challenge the vote results despite his feed showing a string of fact checks and warning labels disputing his claims of election fraud.

Both companies have invested in around-the-clock moderation teams to monitor Mr Trump and other politicians’ comments in the run-up and during the election process to ensure any disinformation was correctly labelled and that early election results were labelled with a warning. 

Mr Trump’s own Twitter account could lose its protections and may face a ban after he leaves the White House.

Parler, which was established by 27-year old John Matze, claims to have 1.7 million users.