«EVERYONE WANTS TO BE MY FRIEND!!!!” wrote a few weeks ago on his social network Truth Social. One of them is . The owner of the Meta giant is not only speaking positively about Trump, but is now aligning his company’s policies with those of the new president, just days before his inauguration. Trump’s longtime ally, Dana Whitewas appointed to Meta’s board of directors, o Joel Kaplanthe company’s most vehemently conservative voice, has been put in charge of international affairs, while lifting restrictions on what users can say about sensitive issues such as immigration and gender.
This latest decision by Zuckerberg was announced through a video he shared on his Instagram account. “It’s time to return to our roots and freedom of speech” he said among other things, without linking his movement to political motives. At the same time, , he will move what is left of the security and content coordination teams from liberal California to Republican Texas. Although the CEO of Meta did not admit any political motivation for all this, the “Guardian” comments that “the only thing missing from the video was Zuckerberg wearing a MAGA hat and holding a rifle”.
This new strategy initially only concerns the US, while there are currently no plans to expand it to other countries. However, this would be difficult as the EU has particularly strict social media legislation, while other countries, such as Australia, Brazil and South Korea, have their own regulations in place.
A big question, however, that arises, beyond the reaction of users, as they were one of the main reasons that content controls were implemented according to the “Economist”. “No reputable company wants their product or service advertised next to a horrific image of sexual exploitation, violence or bigotry” he wrote
since this is the company that four years ago blocked Trump from its social media after the Capitol invasion. The feelings were mutual, of course, as Facebook had been fully targeted by Trump, who as recently as last August was saying that Zuckerberg “he would spend the rest of his life in prison” if he tried to interfere in the US elections in November.
The climate began to change when Meta’s CEO clashed with his government Joe Bidenfrom which he allegedly received multiple pressures. Indeed, in a letter to Congress on August 26, Zuckerberg said he had been pressured by the FBI to withdraw from his platforms, in 2020, a New York Post investigation into the president’s son Hunter Biden. The latter had been convicted of illegal possession of a weapon while under the influence of drugs and was set to plead guilty to tax fraud before being pardoned by his father in late 2024.
Along with the rest of the Big Tech tycoons
The big shift accelerated after Trump’s election. In late November, Zuckerberg took his staff to Mar-a-Lago, the president-elect’s Florida home, presented the Republican with a pair of Ray-Ban “smart” glasses and agreed to sponsor his Jan. 20 inauguration. in the amount of one million dollars.
Big Tech moguls followed suit. , who was systematically criticized by Trump during his first term, now seems to be on his side. Trump had blamed Bezos for the critical content of his newspaper. “He’s using the Washington Post for leverage so that politicians in Washington don’t tax Amazon the way it should be taxed” he had said. Bezos spoke of political retaliation. In a 2019 lawsuit, Amazon claimed it lost a $10 billion contract. dollars with the Pentagon from Microsoft because Trump had exerted undue pressure to harm Bezos.
Bezos made the “first move” to reach out to the then-candidate by canceling the paper’s endorsement of the Democrat Kamala Harrisciting impartiality. “Most people think the media is biased” he had said to justify his decision. He then went to Mar-a-Lago, where he had dinner just before Christmas with Trump and Musk.
Bezos will fund Trump’s inauguration to be broadcast by Amazon — which also produced a $40 million documentary. dollars for the Melania Trump. THE Sam Altmanfounder of OpenAI, will also fund Trump’s inauguration, as will Tim Cook of Apple who reportedly personally awarded him a million dollars.
