Meta Donates $1 Million to President-elect Trump’s Inaugural Fund

Meta, the parent corporation of Facebook and Instagram, has contributed $1 million (£786,000) to an inauguration fund for President-elect Donald Trump. Mark Zuckerberg, who heads the technology conglomerate, dined with Trump at his Mar-a-Lago resort in November, having aimed to mend his and his company’s relationship with Trump following the election. Trump had previously been highly critical of Mr. Zuckerberg and Facebook, labeling the platform “anti-Trump” in 2017. Meta is not believed to have made comparable donations to President Joe Biden’s inaugural fund in 2020 or to Trump’s prior inaugural fund in 2016. The company confirmed its million-dollar contribution to the inaugural fund to several news outlets on Wednesday. Inauguration funds are utilized to cover expenses for events and activities when a new president assumes office; some consider them an attempt to curry favor with a new administration. The donation was corroborated by CBS, the BBC’s US media partner, on Wednesday, and was initially reported by the Wall Street Journal. The BBC has sought comment from Meta. Trump is scheduled to be sworn in as the 47th US president on January 20. Historically, relations between Trump and Mr. Zuckerberg have been considerably less amicable. They particularly deteriorated when Facebook and Instagram suspended the former president’s accounts in 2021, after stating he praised those involved in violence at the Capitol on January 6. Since that time, Trump has engaged in a war of words against Meta, calling Facebook an “enemy of the people” in March. He asserted that a law which would ban TikTok in the US unless sold off by its parent company, ByteDance, would unfairly benefit Facebook. In August, Mr. Zuckerberg informed Republican lawmakers in a letter that he regretted yielding to pressure from the Biden administration to “censor” some Facebook and Instagram content during the coronavirus pandemic. Trump wrote in a book published in September that Mr. Zuckerberg would “spend the rest of his life in prison” if he tried to intervene in the 2024 election. However, the president-elect appears to have since softened his position. He stated on a podcast in October that it was “nice” Mr. Zuckerberg was “staying out of the election,” and thanked him for a personal phone call after he faced an assassination attempt. Still, Mr. Zuckerberg is not nearly as close to Trump as fellow tech titan Elon Musk. The Tesla and X owner has been dubbed Trump’s “First Buddy” because of his extensive donations to Trump’s election campaign. That led to Mr. Musk being placed in charge of a new Department of Government Efficiency (Doge). There has been no such reconciliation between Mr. Musk and Mr. Zuckerberg, although the cage fight between them that was once mooted now appears to be off. Copyright 2024 BBC. All rights reserved. The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites. Read about our approach to external linking.