Who supports Trump? Social media pokes fun at Iowa defeat

After what seemed like a long silence by his standards, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump returned to Twitter on Tuesday morning, striking an uncharacteristically low-key tone after his defeat in the Iowa caucuses.

"Because I was told I could not do well in Iowa, I spent very little there - a fraction of Cruz & Rubio. Came in a strong second. Great honour," tweeted Trump (@realDonaldTrump).

Trump's Twitter account went dark from Monday evening for roughly 15 hours, an unusually long period for the billionaire real estate mogul and former reality TV star who averages about 17 tweets a day, according to TwitterCounter.com.

Trump has led opinion polls for months among Republicans seeking the party's nomination for the Nov. 8 election.

But in his first test at the hands of voters in the Iowa caucuses, which kicked off the parties' nominating contests, Trump finished second to U.S. Senator Ted Cruz of Texas. Senator Marco Rubio of Florida was a close third.

Trump's showing in Iowa inspired numerous derisive jokes on Twitter.

On Tuesday, Twitter users used the hashtag #___SupportsDonaldTrump to take shots at Trump, filling in the blank with universally loathed people.

"Your high school teacher that didn't let you use the bathroom when you needed to go badly #___SupportsDonaldTrump," Faran (@Raizand_) tweeted.

Trump, who never tires of calling himself a "winner," had his own favourite epithet used against him online. Twitter erupted on Tuesday over the news that a website called "loser.com" directed Internet users to Trump's Wikipedia page.

Several Twitter users also noted Trump's penchant for the quotation: "No one remembers who came in second," a saying attributed to famed golfer Walter Hagen. Trump tweeted the saying at least twice - once in June 2014 and another time in December 2013.

"Question: Who came in 2nd in Iowa?" tweeted Kimberly Murray (@Kimberlyville81) on Tuesday. "Trump: No one remembers."

The Iowa caucuses themselves did not escape Twitter ridicule.

A Twitter poll on Monday from Kim Kardashian West (@KimKardashian) has amassed more than 425,000 responses, which, as The Hill political website reported, is more than the number of people who attended the Iowa caucuses.

In fairness, the reality TV star has upward of 39 million Twitter followers, while the most recent U.S. census data estimates Iowa's population at about 3.1 million.