A new feature on X has revealed that a number of major MAGA accounts on the platform are operated by people based overseas. And in the days since these accounts were exposed, President Donald Trump has continued boosting several of them.
Many of the accounts, which have large followings and claim to be conservative people based in Texas or “America First” accounts “promoting good resisting evil,” are actually operated everywhere from Chile and Nigeria to Russia and across Eastern Europe.
These accounts largely post about divisive issues, including immigration, gender, and Israel. In one instance, a verified account called MAGA NATION with almost 400,000 followers and the American flag in its screen name was revealed to be operated from a non-EU country in Eastern Europe. Many of the accounts feature the names of members of the Trump family, including an Ivanka Trump news account with over 1 million followers that was based in Nigeria. The account has since been suspended.
On Saturday, Trump shared on Truth Social a screenshot of an X post from an account called “Fan Trump Army.” The account has over 500,000 followers and features an image of Trump as its profile picture. The account operator, according to the new X location feature, is based in India. The account is followed by several people convicted for their parts in the attack on the Capitol on January 6, 2021, as well as disgraced former national security adviser Michael Flynn.
In recent days, the account holder changed their bio to read: “An Indian who loves America, President Trump, Musk!” An earlier version of the account’s bio, however, made no mention of the account being run by someone in India.
On Sunday, Trump shared another screenshot of an X post on Truth Social, this time from a verified X account with the screen name: “Commentary Donald J. Trump.”
“Would you support the idea of foreign-born citizens be barred from running for office? Yes or No,” reads the screenshot. The post also featured a picture of Representative Ilhan Omar with Omar Fateh, a Somali-American lawmaker in Minnesota who unsuccessfully ran for mayor of Minneapolis earlier this month. The account has a picture of the president as its profile picture with a bald eagle in front of the American flag as its background picture. According to X’s new feature, the account appears to be run from somewhere in Africa. (In some cases, X doesn’t specify the country, only the continent or region.)
In responses to Trump’s post, many called for a ban on foreign-born citizens holding political office, with some posters going further and calling for Omar and Fateh to be deported.