Barack Obama
Candidates in this year's presidential election are being followed by porn stars, but none of them followed back. However, Obama's account followed four female porn stars and the gay prostitution website Rent Boy. This scandal also brought to light the fact Obama has bought followers. Many of the accounts following the president are "ghost accounts" who have "never written any tweets."
STORY SOURCE
President Obama's dubious
Twitter follows remind politicians to be wary of
social media
Saturday 14 May 2016 - With its extensive reach and immediacy, social media is a powerful tool for politicians. However, the same advantages can backfire and lead to very public embarrassment. Now, Barack Obama’s official Twitter account has been found to be following a number of female porn stars. The President’s personal account @BarackObama – not the account which represents him as President of the United States, @POTUS – was found to be following at least four adult actresses among the many thousands of people it follows.
The @BarackObama account, along with, 653,000 other people, had followed the account of porn star Asa Akira, who wrote on her biography “I have an award winning a**hole”. The Obama account also followed Joanna Angel (who posted a number of pornographic images to her page), Nikki Benz (“Penthouse Pet of the Year”) and Ashley Steel, business media outlet Fast Company reported.
Obama’s Twitter account is run by the staff of Organizing for Action, a grassroots group campaigning for Democratic party policies. The President himself is unlikely to know about the specific details of the page, particularly since it follows around 636,000 people. In addition, a large number of people followed by the @BarackObama page are ‘ghost accounts’, with very few followers and who have never written any tweets.
Why Does President Obama’s
Twitter Account Follow Porn Stars?
Sarah Kessler 05.13.16 12:45 PM - President Obama’s Twitter account, which is run by his "Organizing for Action" staff, follows 636,000 accounts. Many of them you might expect: Michelle Obama, Joe Biden, John Kerry. Even Mariah Carey and Snoop Dogg don't really raise an eyebrow.
But several accounts on the presidential follow list fit a different theme: Asa Akira, a porn star who has 653,000 followers and, in her Twitter bio, states "I have an award-winning asshole." Joanna Angel (390,000 followers), who describes herself as a "multiple award winning punk porno princess;" Penthouse Pet Of The Year Nikki Benz (808,000 followers); and Ashley Steel (138,000 followers), who writes that she is a "Porn Star, Doggy mama, Happiness Junkie, XXX Model, Buddhist, & Total nerd."
So why is the official Twitter account for the president of the United States publicly following adult movie stars? Of course, American porn stars are just as American (and just as worthy of the President's ear) as anyone else, but this interaction is nonetheless an unusual move for an elected official's campaign-managed social media account. Neither the Organizing for Action campaign nor the White House immediately responded to a request for comment. A spokesperson for Joe Rospars, Obama's principal digital strategist for both presidential campaigns, said that he was not available to comment...
The current presidential candidates seemed to have been more intentional about their follow lists, if for no other reason than that Twitter had blocked auto-following before the start of their 2016 campaigns. Nikki Benz, Penthouse's 2011 "Pet Of The Year," has followed Bernie Sanders, Hillary Clinton, and Donald Trump. None of them have followed back.
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