Washington, Oct 21 (TIWN) Former US President Donald Trump has announced plans to launch a new social media network, called TRUTH Social, media reports said.

He said the platform would "stand up to the tyranny of big tech", accusing them of silencing opposing voices in the US. 

Social media played a pivotal role in Mr Trump's bid for the White House and was his favourite means of communication as president.  But Mr Trump was banned from Twitter and suspended from Facebook after his supporters stormed the US Capitol.  Social media firms were under pressure throughout Mr Trump's presidency to ban him, with his posts criticised as insulting, inflammatory or peddling outright falsehoods. 

Last year Twitter and Facebook began deleting some of his posts or labelling them as misleading, such as one in which he said Covid was "less lethal" than the flu.  They took the decision to ban or suspend Mr Trump after the January riots, which followed a speech in which he made baseless claims of electoral fraud. 

Responding to the riots, Mr Trump called those at the Capitol "patriots" and showed no sign of accepting the result of the election, prompting Twitter and Facebook to rule that it was too risky to allow him to continue to use their sites.