Trump has said he wouldn't return to Twitter even if offered, but he told Fox News on Monday April 25 he would instead stay on his fledgling Truth Social platform, which has struggled to get off the ground.
Truth Social was the most downloaded iPhone app on Tuesday, at least for that day. Its launch has been beset with technical problems and it has yet to make it onto the national political radar.
Despite the fact that many people are skeptical that Trump would be able to rejoin Twitter if given the chance.
A Washington Post article on Monday quoted anonymous Trump aides who said the ex-President badly misses Twitter, which he employed as president to settle scores and shape the news cycle.
Musk has not addressed the Trump question while pursuing Twitter in recent weeks.
Analysts believe that Musk is driven by a desire to control a visible marketing platform more than by a desire to shape American politics.
Many people read Musk's criticism of Twitter content policies as suggesting he will lift the Trump ban.
The deal will be announced on Monday, as free speech is the heart of a functioning democracy, and Twitter is the digital city square where matters vital to the future of humanity are debated, Musk said.
A Trump reinstatement is not without a downside for Musk, who could face a pushback beyond the world of Twitter.
Daniel Binns, chief executive of Interbrand North America in New York, said that Trump is about as polarizing an issue as to any imaginable.
In an email, Binns told AFP that there might be a short-lived boycott of Tesla amongst a group of potential customers.
He said that he would be concerned with a more corrosive erosion of the affinity people have for Tesla and the sense of empathy they have for their customer base over the long term.
There were experts in politics and social media who characterised a return to Trump as more likely than not, because of Musk's freedom of speech statements and Trump's standing as a potential 2024 Republican frontrunner.
The New York Times columnist Kara Swisher said that Trump's Twitter executives would have been under enormous pressure to reconsider the ban even if the company had not been bought by Musk. Swisher, who was the director of the University of Virginia Center for Politics, predicted that Trump would have an outsized presence if he rejoined Twitter.
According to Sabato, Trump is going to inject Trump back into the Republican mainstream, because he believes that Trump is the worst thing that can happen to American Democracy in my lifetime. Sabato believes that Trump will use Twitter to overshadow other politicians, including current President Joe Biden, who doesn't fill the news hole as Trump did.
Karen North, founding director of the digital social media program at the University of Southern California's Annenberg School, believes that Trump would first give Truth Social a chance before returning to Twitter if given the opportunity.
Trump's statements are no longer newsworthy by default, which is a key difference from his White House days. North said that it creates questions for journalists on how much to amplify the former president's comments.
She noted that Trump has surprising staying power, and that some of the fascinations may be the result of his diminished presence in the daily news.
She said that people are still so curious and so polarised by him.