Facebook chief exec acknowledges private dinner with Trump
When you’re the chief executive of one of the world’s best- known companies, you can probably expect a lot of invitations to dinner at some exclusive locations. And, depending on your schedule, you might not be able to say yes to every invite.
But, when you get a chance to dine at the White House, well, it has to be hard to say no to that. Even if you are Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg.
Facebook confirmed a report from NBC News that said Zuckerberg had dinner with President Trump at the White House in October. It was the second time Zuckerberg met with Trump this fall, after the two held a brief White House meeting in September.
“As is normal for a CEO of a major US company, Mark accepted an invitation to have dinner with the President and First Lady at the White House,” a Facebook spokesperson said, in a statement given to this news organization.
Zuckerberg’s dinner with Trump occurred when
Zucker - berg was in Washington, D.C. to give a speech about free expression at Georgetown University, and also to testify before Congress on Facebook’s plans for its Libra cryptocurrency.
However, Zuckerberg wasn’t alone with the president and First Lady Melania Trump.
According to NBC, Facebook board member Peter Thiel also attended the dinner. Thiel, who co-founded PayPal and software and data- analytics company Palantir, was a major donor to Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign, spoke about Trump at the 2016 Republican National Convention, and remains one of the few well-known Silicon Valley supporters of Trump.
It was not disclosed what was on the agenda, nor on the menu, during Zuckerberg’s and Thiel’s dinner with Trump.