U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry admonished President-elect Donald Trump’s use of Twitter to practice diplomacy at a U.S. Institute of Peace event Tuesday.
Kerry’s admonishment came after a lengthy diatribe lamenting what he called a “fact-less political environment.” In thinly-veiled swipes at the incoming Trump administration, Kerry warned the audience of foreign policy luminaries to remember past historical events when “sloganeering” politics were deployed in times of economic distress.
“If policy is going to to made in 140 characters on twitter, and every reasonable measure of accountability is being bypassed, we have a problem,” Kerry declared. Kerry continued that the U.S. should institute a “measure of accountability” when foreign policy is being made.
Trump’s critics frequently focus on his use of Twitter to conduct diplomacy, and painted his call with Taiwan’s president as an ignorant blunder. The call was a carefully planned maneuver by Trump’s transition team, contrary to Kerry and other critics’ claims.
A Daily Caller News Foundation review of the State Departments twitter accounts also found frequent use of twitter by the U.S. government to conduct diplomacy. The U.S. Department of State, its spokesman, and representatives routinely use Twitter to send major messages to friends and foes. State Department spokesman John Kirby used to Twitter to call on Turkish media to stop falsely reporting on the U.S. role in the recent Istanbul terror attack.
Kirby also used Twitter Dec. 27 to dispute the Times of Israel’s report that Department of State officials colluded with Palestinian officials on a recent U.N. resolution condemning Israel. In stark contrast, Trump is often lampooned for disputing the facts of stories on Twitter.
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