Meta donates $1M to Trump's inaugural fund after Zuckerberg Mar-a-Lago meeting

Meta, the parent company of Instagram, Facebook and WhatsApp, said Thursday it had donated $1 million to President-elect Donald Trump’s inaugural fund. 

A spokesperson for the company confirmed the donation, which The Wall Street Journal reported late Wednesday. 

The donation is the latest swing in the up-and-down relationship between Trump and CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s company. Trump this year publicly threatened Zuckerberg with “life in prison” if he did anything Trump viewed as illegal during this year’s presidential election campaign. 

The two men had dinner together last month at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida. 

Zuckerberg declined during the campaign to endorse either Trump or Vice President Kamala Harris, although he did praise Trump’s response to an assassination attempt in July, calling his raised fist after the shooting “one of the most badass things I’ve ever seen in my life.” 

The company’s relationship with Trump and other politicians has long been complicated because of how many people get their news from Meta’s apps. Trump’s successful 2016 campaign credited Facebook with helping it reach voters with digital advertising. In 2021, Meta suspended Trump’s Facebook and Instagram accounts, as did some other platforms, like Twitter, after the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol. Trump’s accounts have been restored. But in recent years, the company has said it is trying to reduce the amount of politics in people’s feeds. 

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Over the next four years, Trump’s administration will determine federal policy in a wide variety of areas that are important to Meta and other tech companies, including regulation of artificial intelligence and antitrust enforcement. 

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At the tail end of Trump’s first term, in December 2020, the Federal Trade Commission sued to try to break up Meta, then known as Facebook. The vote was 3-2, with then-Chairman Joseph Simons, a Trump appointee, joining two Democratic appointees in approving the lawsuit. The case is still pending.

One Meta board member, venture capitalist Marc Andreessen, told the Free Press website this week that he has spent about half his time since the Nov. 5 election at Mar-a-Lago helping with the transition. Peter Thiel, another investor and a former Meta board member, is also a longtime Trump adviser.