diff --git a/rostwitter/python/rostwitter/twitter.py b/rostwitter/python/rostwitter/twitter.py
index 0da283171..c56cf5289 100644
--- a/rostwitter/python/rostwitter/twitter.py
+++ b/rostwitter/python/rostwitter/twitter.py
@@ -60,8 +60,8 @@ def _request_url(self, url, verb, data=None):
 
     def _check_post_request(self, request):
         valid = True
+        data = simplejson.loads(request.content)
         if request.status_code != 200:
-            data = simplejson.loads(request.content)
             rospy.logwarn('post tweet failed. status_code: {}'
                           .format(request.status_code))
             if 'errors' in data: