This is the story of what happened when a reality star with trigger-happy Twitter fingers and a polarizing former Secretary of State ran against each other to become President of the United States.
Today marks the culmination of what has been one of the wildest races for the presidency in modern times — and much of the bickering, jokes, highs and lows played out on Twitter, providing us with the perfect time capsule for looking back on Election 2016.
Republican nominee Donald Trump’s “antics,” including on Twitter, helped him generate $2 billion worth of free media coverage, according to a September study by Harvard Professors Thales Teixeira and John Quelch.
Related: New App Helps Clinton Supporters Trade Votes to Key States
Trump loves Twitter so much, he even went on a now-infamous “3 a.m. Twitter rant,” about Hillary Clinton supporter and former Miss Universe Alicia Machado, whom he body shamed for gaining weight.
There was the October surprise of the FBI re-opening and then closing an investigation into Democratic nominee Clinton’s emails after some were found on Anthony Weiner’s computer.
Speaking of being “creepy,” a 2005 tape of Trump making lewd comments about women might have been the biggest bombshell of the campaign. He called it “locker room talk.” Twitter pushed back.
Trump took to social media later that night to apologize.
There was also plenty of name-calling. Clinton later expressed regret for referring to some Trump supporters as a “basket of deplorables.”
In the third debate, Trump called his opponent a “nasty woman” as she spoke and also referred to deporting “bad hombres,” using Spanish slang for “dude.”
Thankfully, it came just in time for the perfect Halloween costumes.
…
