The White House(WASHINGTON) — When President Obama leaves office in January, he won’t be taking the @POTUS Twitter handle with him.
The White House announced part of its transition plans in the realm of social media on Monday. President Obama, who was the first to use the @POTUS Twitter handle, will hand over the account to the next president on Jan. 20, 2017.
The new tweeting president will start with a blank timeline — all of Obama’s tweets will be removed — but they will still get to keep the more than 11 million followers accumulated by President Obama.
The National Archives and Records Administration has created a new handle — @POTUS44 — which will archive all of President Obama’s tweets. They will do the same for other White House Twitter handles, including @WhiteHouse, @FLOTUS, @PressSec and @VP.
The next president will acquire President Obama’s other social media handles, including Instagram and Facebook, while the president’s photos and posts will be migrated to a different account.
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