In a surprise move, Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta has contributed $1 million to President-elect Donald Trump’s 2024 inaugural fund, marking a significant change in the relationship between the ultra-woke tech giant and the incoming administration.
The Wall Street Journal reports that Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, has made a $1 million donation to President-elect Donald Trump’s 2024 inaugural fund, confirming a shift in the once-strained relationship between CEO Mark Zuckerberg and the incoming president. This contribution comes after a contentious election campaign in which Trump had threatened to punish Zuckerberg if he attempted to influence the election against him. Trump had previously labeled the tech lord “Zuckerschmuck” and called Facebook the “true enemy of the people.”
The donation and efforts to court the incoming administration highlight the delicate balance technology CEOs must strike, as their companies have often been targets of criticism from Trump and other Republicans, while their workforces are made up of mostly fanatical leftists. With Republicans poised to control the White House and both houses of Congress, and calls for new regulation of tech mounting, some executives are adopting a new stance toward Trump.
Zuckerberg’s efforts to strengthen ties with Trump has included a November dinner with Trump at his private Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Florida. The dinner focused on general relationship-building and capped off a two-day series of meetings between Zuckerberg’s advisers and incoming White House officials.
Before the dinner, Zuckerberg personally demonstrated Meta’s Ray-Ban smart glasses to Trump, gifting them to the president-elect. Zuckerberg’s team had also informed the inaugural fund of Meta’s planned donation prior to the dinner. Zuckerberg also praised Trump’s response to an assassination attempt and expressed optimism about a Trump presidency to other business leaders. Trump, in turn, stated that he likes Zuckerberg “much better now” and believed he would stay out of the election.
Breitbart News previously reported that Zuckerberg hopes to play an “active role” in the administration’s tech policy:
The New York Post reports that Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, is making moves to establish a closer relationship with the incoming Trump administration. Nick Clegg, Meta’s head of global affairs, recently stated that CEO Mark Zuckerberg is keen on having “an active role in the debates that any administration needs to have about maintaining America’s leadership in the technological sphere … and particularly the pivotal role that AI will play.”
Despite this thawing of relations, Trump’s nominees for various positions indicate that his administration will take a tough stance on Big Tech, particularly social media companies accused of censoring conservative voices. The nomination of Andrew Ferguson to the FTC, which has antitrust oversight of Meta, signals a potential confrontation, with Ferguson vowing to “end Big Tech’s vendetta against competition and free speech.”
Read more at the Wall Street Journal here.
Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of free speech and online censorship.
