The White House has joined everyone’s favorite ephemeral messaging platform.
The launch of the White House Snapchat account comes just one day before President Barack Obama’s final State of The Union, which will take place at 7pm ET on Tuesday.
The White House
Obama’s White House has been keeping up with social media as it evolves. They’ve recently launched personal Facebook page and Twitter account for the president, who occasionally posts tweets and status updates written by the commander-in-chief himself.
“At the White House, our digital strategy centers around meeting people where they are,” White House Director of Product Management Joshua Miller wrote on the White House blog. “This decentralized approach, in response to the proliferation of social media, aims to provide the American people with a multitude of ways to engage with their government.”
The White House’s Snapchat account, WhiteHouse, will provide followers with behind-the-scenes looks at the president’s life in office, including “the White House’s State of the Union preparations, with footage and angles you won’t find anywhere else,” according to Miller.
The White House
Snapchat has become one of the go-to platforms for politicians, especially Republicans, who have embraced the social network as a path to younger voters who might not otherwise pay attention to politics.
It’s unclear if Obama himself will ever man the Snapchat account, but a White House Official told BuzzFeed News that followers should “stay tuned for the president’s participation down the line.”
Illustration by Max Fleishman
