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New Speaker Paul Ryan Is Stepping Up His Social-Media Game

In his first week, Ryan has bolstered his communications team and taken to Twitter.

Rebecca Velez,
National Journal

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National Journal

It’s Paul Ry­an’s sev­enth new day since be­ing in­stated as speak­er of the House and he’s already re­vamped his pres­ence on so­cial me­dia, part of an ef­fort to show that he’s fully en­gaged with his new role. 

Ry­an’s pre­vi­ous Twit­ter handle, @Rep­PaulRy­an, pos­ted an oc­ca­sion­al tweet every few days. But this week, with the me­dia team that comes with speak­er.gov, sharp-look­ing new videos, quotes, and pho­to­graphs are be­ing pos­ted mul­tiple times a day.

As Politico re­por­ted earli­er this week, Ry­an has built up his com­mu­nic­a­tions team, hir­ing eight new staffers who will help get his mes­sage across. Oct. 29 also brought a new Face­book pro­file pic­ture and a new twit­ter handle, @Speak­erRy­an.

Ry­an tweeted on Oct. 8 that he would not be a can­did­ate for speak­er, and that he be­lieved he could best serve his coun­try as chair­man of the Ways and Means Com­mit­tee. Yet a few tweets about the Pack­ers from his per­son­al ac­count later, and the hasht­ag #Speak­erRy­an was in full force. While Ry­an is now fully em­bra­cing the title, it is un­clear as to when John Boehner will be up­dat­ing his own so­cial-me­dia pro­files, which still have him lis­ted as speak­er of the House.

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