Sadiq Khan: Donald Trump’s presidency led to me getting more racist online abuse 

The Mayor of London has said Donald Trump’s period as US president led to a significant rise in racial abuse directed at him.Speaking at Stanford University near San Francisco on his US trade mission, Sadiq Khan said that banning Mr Trump from Twitter led to a sharp drop in such abuse.“During those four years he was president, that led to me having to receive police protection and a lot of racial abuse,” the Mayor said in comments carried by the BBC.“In the last year of him being president, once he was banned from Twitter, I received the least racial abuse of any time over five years.“On the one hand, social media – Facebook, Twitter – great. On the other hand, that’s the consequence of lack of control and lack of regulation.”Mr Trump first criticised the London leader in 2017 for his response to the London Bridge terror attacks. Then during a visit to the UK in 2019, he called Mr Khan a “stone-cold loser” who had failed to manage crime rates in the capital.

As the first Muslim to be elected the mayor of a major Western city, Mr Khan used his appearance at the Stanford Speakers Bureau to offer Elon Musk some advice about allowing Mr Trump to return to Twitter.

The Tesla boss said that, if his $44 billion (£35 billion) takeover deal is finalised later this year, he will reverse the ban imposed on the former US leader as part of his plan to make permanent account suspensions a “rare thing”.

“Let’s wait and see if Donald Trump has learnt his lesson,” Mr Khan told Stanford’s students.

“If it’s the case that Donald Trump is going to use Twitter responsibly, I think that’s all well and good. If he breaks the rules, there needs to be consequences.

“We can’t afford a situation where people think social media is where people behave irresponsibly, where you see an increase in not just racism, sexism and misogyny but also division.

“I hope Elon Musk, now he’s in charge of Twitter, understands that.”

Mayor makes fevered pitch