Romney Confirms He's Behind the 'Pierre Delecto' Twitter Account

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Utah Senator Mitt Romney confirmed a Slate story late Sunday night that claimed he was behind an anonymous Twitter account, known as 'Pierre Delecto' he's used to be a "lurker" on social media.

The account was first revealed by Slate's Ashley Feinberg, who managed to track down Romney's anonymous account by going through the Twitter accounts of some of Romney's relatives for clues. At one point, Feinberg found that Romney's oldest grandchild, Allie Romney Critchlow, only had 481 followers, helping the reporter narrow the search for Romney's account.

Combing through Critchlow's followers, Feinberg says she noticed one account, @qaws9876, which was public and followed around the same number of accounts the Utah senator had mentioned he followed in an interview with The Atlantic. The profile used the name 'Pierre Delecto' and followed all of the Romney clan on Twitter as well as a number of Romney-2012 campaign accounts, including one official one that was apparently started when Romney was thinking about running for senate in New Hampshire.

The user had only tweeted a handful of times, including replies to prominent users online who criticized the senator. In one, Romney replied to Washington Post blogger Jennifer Rubin, who was critical of Romney's strategy in confronting Trump was "non-confrontation verging on spinelessness."

"Jennifer, you need to take a breath," Delecto wrote. "Maybe you can then acknowledge the people who agree with you in large measure even if not in every measure."

Romney's nom de plume on Twitter also liked a number of tweets that were critical of President Donald Trump, including one that appeared to suggest the use of the 25th Amendment to remove the president in response to the president's recent decisions on Syria and Turkey.

Shortly after the story broke on Sunday, Pierre's account went private and Romney told The Atlantic's McKay Coppins that he was behind the 'Pierre Delecto' account on Twitter.

"Just spoke to @MittRomney on the phone, and asked him about Pierre Delecto," Coppins wrote. "His only response: "C'est moi." Updated my story accordingly."

Photo: Getty Images


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