By Seun Opejobi
Former United States President Donald Trump has instituted legal action against two co-founders of Trump Media over the mismanagement of his social media site, Truth Social.
Trump said the two men, Wes Moss and Andy Litinsky, should lose their shares of the company for mismanaging his social media site. The duo already filed a suit against Trump in February to prevent him from reducing their 8.6 per cent stake in the firm.
They pitched the idea of Truth Social following the Capitol riot after Trump was banned from Twitter, now X. Their shares are currently valued at around $600 million (£477 million).
Both co-founders met Trump as contestants on NBC’s The Apprentice reality show.
In the lawsuit, filed on March 24 in a Florida state court, lawyers for the former president said Messrs. Moss and Litinsky were in charge of Trump Media & Technology Group’s daily operations, but “failed spectacularly at every turn.”
Trump Media & Technology Group (TMTG) is the parent company of Truth Social.
Trump’s lawyers claim the two executives in particular slowed down the process of taking Trump Media public, including by finding an appropriate merger company.
TMTG went public last week through a merger with a special purpose acquisition company, or SPAC.
In their February lawsuit, Moss and Litinsky claimed the former president was trying to reduce their stake in the firm by increasing the company’s total number of shares from 120 million to 1 billion.
Trump founded TMTG in 2021 after he was kicked off of major social media platforms for his actions during the January 6 Capitol riot.
Moss and Litinsky suggested Truth Social as an alternative to mainstream social media sites. They later agreed to a deal in which Trump would own 90% of the platform when it was a private company.
Shares in Truth Social skyrocketed last week, surging as high as $79 (£63) after Trump Media went public despite the business facing government investigations and other hurdles in its merger deal. The stock price has since fallen considerably.
