Trump's Truth Social lays bare narrow obsessions of an extremely online president

President Trump speaks. Saul Loeb/AFP via hide caption toggle caption Saul Loeb/AFP via Stay up to date with our Politics newsletter, sent weekly . On March 1, the day after U.S. forces bombed Iran and began a war that's now more than nine weeks long, President Trump posted 30 times on Truth Social. Just after midnight, he posted about the bombing campaign, including a threat to retaliate if Iran itself retaliated ("THEY BETTER NOT DO THAT"). But he soon had a lot more on his mind; mid-morning, he posted a video portraying Senator Mitch McConnell as the floppy, deceased Bernie from Weekend at Bernie's . He posted a Tiktok video praising his State of the Union – a speech he had given five days prior – then reposted that video , along with a screenshot of a post on the social media site X. Just after noon, he posted an update on the war ("we have destroyed and sunk 9 Iranian Naval Ships, some of them relatively large and important"). Mid-afternoon, he posted a string of Trump-friendly news coverage, including a New York Post article from September 2024 about how Lady Gaga's father endorsed Trump in the presidential race. Shortly thereafter, in the span of five minutes, he posted 10 times, all of them lists of screenshots of praise from X users for his State of the Union address. …