Will Biden get to keep the @POTUS Twitter account followers?

According to Business Insider, the Joe Biden transition team learned that the followers of the official presidential and White House Twitter accounts may not be transferred to the new administration in January.

Barack Obama was the first sitting president to use an official Twitter account, and his administration's presence included @POTUS, @FLOTUS, @PressSec and more. When he left office, his administration insisted that Twitter transfer those accounts and their followers to the new Trump administration, which they did. However, it appears that the same process may not be followed when the administrations transition again next month.

Rob Flaherty, digital director for President-elect Biden, tweeted Tuesday that the follower numbers of accounts like @POTUS will start from zero when the new administration takes over. Nicholas Pacilio, a spokesperson for Twitter, said in a statement to Business Insider that “Twitter has been in ongoing discussions with the Biden transition team on a number of aspects related to White House account transfers.” He declined to comment on how this process might typically be handled and if it is indeed true that the follower counts will be reset.