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Tech leaders are getting closer to Trump, prompting questions about Silicon Valley’s politics.
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Mark Zuckerberg said it’s necessary to have a productive relationship with the government.
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He has previously criticized the Biden administration’s relationship with Meta.
High-profile tech titans like Mark Zuckerberg have largely embraced President Donald Trump since he won a second term, with many of them making large donations to the president’s inaugural fund and socializing among MAGA world at Mar-a-Lago.
Podcaster Dwarkesh Patel asked the Meta CEO to elaborate on his connection to Trump during a Tuesday interview.
“Our default as an American company should be to try to have a productive relationship with whoever is running the government,” Zuckerberg said.
Zuckerberg dined with Trump at Mar-a-Lago the day before Thanksgiving in 2024, and he stood shoulder-to-shoulder with his fellow tech billionaires at Trump’s inauguration in January.
He told Patel that Meta’s attempts to work with the Biden administration didn’t pan out.
“I’ve been pretty public with some of my frustrations with the previous administration — how they basically did not engage with us or the business community more broadly,” he said.
In August, Zuckerberg called out the Biden administration, saying Meta was pressured to remove Facebook posts related to COVID-19 by the government. Zuckerberg said at the time he regretted not pushing back on the White House.
A strong relationship between Big Tech and the government is “necessary” for progress, Zuckerberg told Patel on Tuesday.
“It’s like we’re trying to build great stuff,” he said. “That’s sort of that’s how I see it, and it’s also how I would guess most others see it.”
A spokesperson for Meta didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
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