President Donald Trump's Twitter account disappeared for 11 minutes on Thursday because of a customer support worker on his last day, according to Twitter.
As Trump's critics cheered his brief moment of forced silence and Twitter struggled to explain who was responsible for deactivating his account, it underscored how important Twitter has been to his presidency -- and how easy it is to pull the plug.
"My Twitter account was taken down for 11 minutes by a rogue employee," Trump wrote from his restored account early Friday, making light of the brief Thursday evening disruption that vexed many of his 41 million followers. "I guess the word must finally be getting out-and having an impact."
Twitter blamed a customer support worker on his last day on the job for deactivating Trump's account on the way out. The San Francisco-based company added Friday that it is still investigating and has "implemented safeguards to prevent this from happening again."
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The New York Times reported Friday, citing two unnamed sources, that it was an outside contractor, not a Twitter staff member, who made the account go dark.
Twitter wouldn't say if it was a contractor and declined further explanation, raising questions not only about its own security measures but about Trump's heavy reliance on a single platform to broadcast his views.
"It's not surprising that even the brief shutdown of the president's Twitter account has provoked debate," said Jameel Jaffer, executive director of Columbia University's Knight First Amendment Institute, which has filed a federal lawsuit challenging Trump's practice of blocking Twitter users who criticize him.
When Trump's account went dark Thursday, some observers assumed it was a formal rebuke. His critics celebrated. Some suggested the lull was too brief.
"Dear Twitter employee who shut down Trump's Twitter: You made America feel better for 11 minutes," wrote U.S. Rep. Ted Lieu, D-Calif., who offered to buy the unidentified worker a Pizza Hut pizza.
Trump supporters warned of censorship.
Just days earlier, the company had shut down the personal account of a close Trump ally, Roger Stone, after a profanity-laced tirade insulting journalists. Stone responded by calling the company the "totalitarian corporate thought police."
Twitter has said it won't ban Trump, even though his critics say he has violated its rules against harassment and intimidation. Just an hour after musing about his temporary Twitter deactivation, Trump was again disparaging Democratic U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren as "Pocahontas" because she has mentioned having American Indian heritage.
Information for this article was contributed by Tali Arbel, Ryan Nakashima and Zeke Miller of The Associated Press.
A Section on 11/04/2017