Politwoops is back, and ready to republish and recover embarrassing tweets deleted by politicians.
Open State Foundation, the government transparency and accountability group that now runs the program collecting deleted tweets by elected officials and candidates, announced an agreement with Twitter on Thursday that will allow it to plug back into the company’s API just in time for 2016.
Twitter sparked an uproar earlier this year when it blocked the program — which was operating in 30 countries and could be expanded to more. Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey later apologized for no longer using the service.
“This agreement is great news for those who believe that the world needs more transparency,” Arjan El Fassed, director of digital transparency organization for Open State Foundation. “Our next step is now to continue and expand our work to enable the public to hold public officials accountable for their public statements.”
The most fun is likely to occur domestically, where the 2016 campaigns have already yielded some incredibly odd and stunning statements, most of them from Donald Trump.
Even politics’ most aggressive tweeter has not been above deleting tweets on third-rail issues — see the missing tweet from Sept. 11, 2013, when he extended his “best wishes to all, even the haters and the losers, on this special date, September 11th.”
The Sunlight Foundation collected the best of 2014’s deleted tweets a year ago, including one from Sen. Ted Cruz showing him posing with Sen. Mike Lee aside a tiger-skin rug.