Florida Governor Ron DeSantis speaks during a session titled “Celebrating the Face of Israel” at the Museum of Tolerance in Jerusalem, April 27, 2023.
Maya Alleruzzo | AFP | Getty Images
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis presidential campaign A massive technical glitch on Twitter prevented him from announcing his candidacy, announcing plans to derail Wednesday night.
“The servers were a little bit tense,” Twitter owner Elon Musk said in the app’s live audio stream as he and DeSantis were supposed to have a conversation that included the governor’s first verbal announcement of the White House.
Musk’s comments came amid crashes, feedback glitches and audio glitches that prevented the conversation on Twitter’s Spaces feature from starting about 25 minutes after its scheduled 6 p.m. ET start time.
Musk and investor David Sachs (an ally of both) started a new Twitter Spaces webcast after the original webcast failed. But technical issues also cropped up in the stream, including in DeSantis’ remarks.
DeSantis filed federal papers earlier in the day, making him formally contesting the Republican presidential nomination. His campaign also released a video in which DeSantis said, “I’m running for president to lead our great American renewal.”
But DeSantis’ unorthodox decision to make a major announcement on an audio-only Twitter tool has drawn the most attention.
The aborted first Spaces event listed more than 500,000 listeners before giving up entirely.
The incident comes as Musk is trying to boost Twitter’s revenue. Earlier this month, he hired Linda Yaccarino, a former advertising executive at NBCUniversal, to succeed him as chief executive of the social media platform.
A DeSantis campaign official tried to turn the heated event into a positive, telling NBC News, “Governor DeSantis has broken the Internet — and that should tell you about his candidacy. Everything you need to know about strength…!”
But DeSantis’ critics and his main political opponents have lashed out at the breakdown feast.
“His collar is too big!” Trump wrote on his own Twitter-like platform, Truth Social.
president joe bidenMeanwhile, his official Twitter account also took the opportunity to raise money for his re-election campaign.
“This link works,” Biden tweeted with a URL linking to his ActBlue donation page.