Since 2006, increasingly more politicians have joined , and are active on, social media networks, in order to reach out to constituents. However, politicians, such as Anthony Weiner, have started to find themselves in the middle of Twitter scandals and criticism, since their posts are openly available to the public. These ramifications may be leading politicians to delete their tweets, but thanks to the Sunlight Foundation and its website Politwoops, deleted tweets by politicians are now archived and ripe for political research. This raises the question Which members of Congress are deleting tweets and why? Thus, I conduct the first known qualitative study on Congress and deleted tweets, to determine what members may be trying to delete. An empirical analysis on raw data, including 500 deleted tweets by Congress members, was used to discover which posts, and by which members, are deleted more often. I hypothesize that Congress members, specifically Republican Senators, are more likely to delete negative tweets, such as posts that are unprofessional, against their constituents' views, or contain controversial issues, in order to ensure public support and avoid backlash.
","abstract_html":"<p>Since 2006, increasingly more politicians have joined , and are active on, social media networks, in order to reach out to constituents. However, politicians, such as Anthony Weiner, have started to find themselves in the middle of Twitter scandals and criticism, since their posts are openly available to the public. These ramifications may be leading politicians to delete their tweets, but thanks to the Sunlight Foundation and its website Politwoops, deleted tweets by politicians are now archived and ripe for political research. This raises the question Which members of Congress are deleting tweets and why? Thus, I conduct the first known qualitative study on Congress and deleted tweets, to determine what members may be trying to delete. An empirical analysis on raw data, including 500 deleted tweets by Congress members, was used to discover which posts, and by which members, are deleted more often. I hypothesize that Congress members, specifically Republican Senators, are more likely to delete negative tweets, such as posts that are unprofessional, against their constituents' views, or contain controversial issues, in order to ensure public support and avoid backlash.</p>","abstract_has_math":false,"creators":["Cardenas, Theresa Loraine"],"institution":null,"degree_name":"Master of Arts (MA)","degree_level":"Masters Thesis","degree_discipline":"Political Science, International Development, and International Affairs","degree_department":null,"school":null,"contributors":["Marija Bekafigo","Kate Greene","Troy Gibson"],"advisors":[],"committee_chairs":[],"committee_members":[],"year":2013,"date_issued":"2013-12-01T08:00:00Z","date_published":"2013-12-01T08:00:00Z","updated_at":"2026-07-24T05:44:58Z","subjects":[],"languages":[],"rights":[],"rights_urls":[],"identifier_entries":[]},"links":{"outbound_url":"https://aquila.usm.edu/masters_theses/434","outbound_label":"Repository record","outbound_source":"dc:identifier"},"metadata_groups":[{"id":"people","label":"People","entries":[{"key":"dc:contributor","label":"Contributor","values":["Marija Bekafigo","Kate Greene","Troy Gibson"]},{"key":"dc:creator","label":"Author","values":["Cardenas, Theresa Loraine"]}]},{"id":"academic_context","label":"Academic Context","entries":[{"key":"dc:date.available","label":"Dc Date Available","values":["2018-11-01T07:00:00Z"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_discipline","label":"Discipline","values":["Political Science, International Development, and International Affairs"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_level","label":"Degree Level","values":["Masters Thesis"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_name","label":"Degree Name","values":["Master of Arts (MA)"]}]},{"id":"identifiers","label":"Identifiers","entries":[{"key":"dc:identifier","label":"Identifier","values":["https://aquila.usm.edu/masters_theses/434"]}]},{"id":"additional","label":"Additional Metadata","entries":[{"key":"dc:description.abstract","label":"Abstract","values":["Since 2006, increasingly more politicians have joined , and are active on, social media networks, in order to reach out to constituents. However, politicians, such as Anthony Weiner, have started to find themselves in the middle of Twitter scandals and criticism, since their posts are openly available to the public. These ramifications may be leading politicians to delete their tweets, but thanks to the Sunlight Foundation and its website Politwoops, deleted tweets by politicians are now archived and ripe for political research. This raises the question Which members of Congress are deleting tweets and why? Thus, I conduct the first known qualitative study on Congress and deleted tweets, to determine what members may be trying to delete. An empirical analysis on raw data, including 500 deleted tweets by Congress members, was used to discover which posts, and by which members, are deleted more often. I hypothesize that Congress members, specifically Republican Senators, are more likely to delete negative tweets, such as posts that are unprofessional, against their constituents' views, or contain controversial issues, in order to ensure public support and avoid backlash.
"]},{"key":"dc:title","label":"Title","values":["The Tweet Delete of Congress: Congress and Deleted Posts on Twitter"]}]}],"canonical_facts":{"dc:contributor":["Marija Bekafigo","Kate Greene","Troy Gibson"],"dc:creator":["Cardenas, Theresa Loraine"],"dc:date.available":["2018-11-01T07:00:00Z"],"dc:description.abstract":["Since 2006, increasingly more politicians have joined , and are active on, social media networks, in order to reach out to constituents. However, politicians, such as Anthony Weiner, have started to find themselves in the middle of Twitter scandals and criticism, since their posts are openly available to the public. These ramifications may be leading politicians to delete their tweets, but thanks to the Sunlight Foundation and its website Politwoops, deleted tweets by politicians are now archived and ripe for political research. This raises the question Which members of Congress are deleting tweets and why? Thus, I conduct the first known qualitative study on Congress and deleted tweets, to determine what members may be trying to delete. An empirical analysis on raw data, including 500 deleted tweets by Congress members, was used to discover which posts, and by which members, are deleted more often. I hypothesize that Congress members, specifically Republican Senators, are more likely to delete negative tweets, such as posts that are unprofessional, against their constituents' views, or contain controversial issues, in order to ensure public support and avoid backlash.
"],"dc:identifier":["https://aquila.usm.edu/masters_theses/434"],"dc:title":["The Tweet Delete of Congress: Congress and Deleted Posts on Twitter"],"thesis:degree_discipline":["Political Science, International Development, and International Affairs"],"thesis:degree_level":["Masters Thesis"],"thesis:degree_name":["Master of Arts (MA)"]},"updated_at":"2026-07-24T05:44:58Z"}