Collision from Home: Anthony Scaramucci: Social Media Will Have a Disastrous Effect on 2020 Election

Former White House communications director says everything Donald Trump does on social media is premeditated and designed to play to his base

Scaramucci warns against underestimating Trump's intelligence, says the president has "great political instincts" and predicts and increasingly polarising campaign

Scaramucci joined WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Huffington Post founder Arianna Huffington, The Handmaid's Tale author Margaret Atwood, and NBA Hall of Famer Shaquille O'Neal at the 30,000-attendee online event Collision from Home

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Web Summit

Jun 25, 2020, 10:38 ET

TORONTO, June 25, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Anthony Scarmucci today said social media will have a disastrous effect on the 2020 US presidential election and suggested that Donald Trump will attempt to be as divisive as possible in his campaign. The former White House communications director made the remarks at the 30,000-attendee online conference Collision from Home, produced by the team behind Web Summit – the world's largest tech conference.

"This is not impetuous behaviour. This is premeditated behaviour. And remember when he's talking on that Twitter feed, plus Instagram and Facebook, he has 150 million people he's reaching – that's one-and-a-half times the Super Bowl audience every time he puts his thumbs on that phone," said Scaramucci, referring to Trump's social media activity.

Scaramucci, who was White House communications director for 10 days in July 2017 before being dismissed, said he spoke to Trump on the phone last Easter, when the president told him he knows that attacking the press plays particularly well to his base and that he won't look to court moderates during his 2020 campaign.

"I said, 'Well what about those moderates, those independents that you're going to need in those swing states to win the election? And I quote, 'I'll worry about the base. Everything else will take care of itself.'" he said.

Watch a clip from the interview here.

About Anthony Scaramucci:

Former White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci founded investment firm SkyBridge Capital in 2005, and is also the founder of Oscar Capital Management. Prior to that, he worked in Goldman Sachs' investment banking, equities and private wealth management divisions.

About Collision:

Collision is known by CBC as the "TIFF for tech", while Inc. Magazine calls it the "fastest-growing tech conference in North America". Collision is set to move online for 2020 with Collision from Home. Collision will return to Toronto as a physical event for the second year from June 21-24, 2021 at the Enercare Centre.

About Web Summit:

Forbes says Web Summit is "the best tech conference on the planet"; Bloomberg calls it "Davos for geeks"; Politico, "the Olympics of tech"; The Guardian, "Glastonbury for geeks"; and, in the words of Inc. Magazine, "Web Summit is the largest technology conference in the world".

Whatever Web Summit is, it wouldn't be possible without an incredible team of over 200 employees based in Dublin, Lisbon, Toronto and Hong Kong, including world-class engineers, data scientists, designers, producers, marketers, salespeople, and more. They've disrupted an old industry by building incredible software and designing mind-blowing events, revolutionising how people and ideas come together to change the world.

Useful links:

Collision images: https://www.flickr.com/photos/collisionconf/
Collision speaker lineup: https://collisionconf.com/speakers

Collision schedule: https://collisionconf.com/schedule

SOURCE Web Summit