Twitter to hand over @POTUS account to Biden on Jan 20

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IANS | 21 Nov, 2020
Micro-blogging site Twitter has announced that it will handover the @POTUS (President of the United States) account to American President-elect Joe Biden after he is inaugurated on January 20, 2021, regardless of whether incumbent leader Donald Trump concedes before that.

The POTUS US government account currently has more than 32.8 million followers. The current tweets posted during the Trump administration will be archived, and the account will be reset to zero tweets.

In a statement to The Hill news website, a Twitter spokesperson confirmed on Friday that the tech giant is "actively preparing to support the transition of White House institutional Twitter accounts on January 20th, 2021", which also includes @WHITEHOUSE, @VP, @FLOTUS, and a number of other official accounts.

The process is being done in consultation with the National Archives and Records Administration, the spokesperson added.

The micro-blogging site has also confirmed that Twitter staffers will soon meet representatives from the Biden-Harris team to "review how the new administration plans to use its government-related accounts".

Major media outlets have projected Biden as the winner of the November 3 presidential election after he won more than the 270 electoral votes needed to secure victory.

Trump, who claimed that the election was a fraud, is yet to concede and was also mounting challenges in court over allegations of vote count misconduct.

A federal law sets what is called the "Safe Harbor" deadline, falling on December 8 this year, the day by which states must submit the winner of the presidential election if they are to be insulated from legal disputes.

Electoral College representatives will meet six days later, on December 14, to formally select the next US President.