Twitter outage interrupts White House push on student loan rates

A Twitter outage on Thursday interrupted the typically prolific tweeting of Congress and the administration.

The White House was in the middle of a planned Twitter Q&A @WHLive, a practice the administration has increasingly used to clarify policy topics after the president speaks. Thursday’s topic was student interest rates, and the day’s appointed question-taker, Mark Zuckerman, had just selected his first question when Twitter went down.

Zuckerman resumed the chat about 20 minutes later, when Twitter service resumed.

President Obama, who has made Twitter a cornerstone of his campaign to pressure Congress on extending interest rates, also jumped back on his account to urge supporters to use the hashtag ‪#DontDoubleMyRate‬.

Members were unable to send tweets, too, but it seems the only one to notice was Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.)

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