Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP Photo
- Lindell was banned from Twitter in 2021 over election misinformation but rejoined the platform on Sunday.
- The account was quickly banned for violating Twitter’s ban evasion policy.
- “Jack Dorsey should be first in line for prison!” Lindell told Insider via text.
MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell was banned from Twitter on Sunday hours after making a return to the platform.
Lindell, a supporter of former President Donald Trump, was banned from Twitter in January 2021 for spreading misinformation about the 2020 election.
On Sunday afternoon, he posted to a new account announcing his return.
“Hello everybody, I’M BACK ON TWITTER. My only account is @MikeJLindell! Please RT and FOLLOW to SPREAD THE WORD,” Lindell said in a tweet, Insider’s Bethany Biron reported.
The tweet also featured a video of Lindell confirming the account was in fact his.
“All those other ones are fake accounts and they’ve been using my name out there, so we started this account,” he said. “Please share with everybody you know, let everybody you know, so we can get the word out at Twitter in case they do take it down. Thanks a lot for helping out.”
About three and a half hours later, the account was suspended.
A Twitter spokesperson told Insider the account was permanently suspended for violating the platform’s rules on ban evasion.
Twitter’s ban evasion policy prohibits anyone from trying to evade a previous ban, including by creating a new account.
Lindell was initially banned from Twitter for violating the platform’s rules on misinformation and its civic-integrity policy, which prohibits sharing false or misleading information about how to vote or election outcomes.
Lindell told Insider Twitter did not give him a reason for the latest ban but called it a “shame.”
“We need to melt down the voting machines and turn them into prison bars,” Lindell said, referencing his own efforts to have voting machines blocked from use in US elections. “Jack Dorsey should be first in line for prison!”
Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey stepped down as CEO in November. Dorsey is still on Twitter’s board but has said he plans to leave when his term expires in late May.
Lindell also said he decided to rejoin Twitter because others were creating fake accounts pretending to be him.
“I put up the Twitter account today to let the public know that none of the fake Mike Lindell accounts on Twitter are mine,” Lindell said, adding that he is still on his own social media platform Frank Social.
His attempt to rejoin the platform came after Twitter announced on Monday that Elon Musk was buying the platform in a $44 billion deal.
The Tesla and SpaceX billionaire has said he is interested in promoting “free speech” on the platform, prompting speculation about potential changes to Twitter’s content moderation policies and previous bans.
Sources recently told The Wall Street Journal that Musk is dismayed that Trump is still banned from Twitter, but the former president previously said he does not plan to return to the platform even if Musk takes over.
“I hope Elon buys Twitter because he’ll make improvements to it and he is a good man, but I am going to be staying on TRUTH,” Trump told Fox News, referring to his own social media platform Truth Social.
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