Former US President Donald Trump claimed that Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg recently apologised to him on a call for censoring the Republican presidential candidate while assuring he won't support Democrats.
“So, Mark Zuckerberg called me. First of all, he called me a few times. He called me after the event and he said, ‘That was really amazing, it was very brave’,” Trump told Fox News.
"He actually announced he's not gonna support a Democrat because he can't because he respected me for what I did that day. They are working on, and I think they fixed it. He’s not doing what he did five years ago, with the 500 million dollars, I don’t believe,” he added.
The interactions between Meta’s chief executive and the former President are notable given the history between the two men. Meta banned Trump from Facebook and Instagram for two years, saying his posts could lead to violence after the January 6, 2021, Capitol riots in DC.
Trump, meanwhile, has called Facebook the “enemy of the people” and insinuated that he would try and jail Zuckerberg if he is elected President again for being an “Election Fraudster.”
Zuckerberg has said publicly that he would not endorse any candidate for President, and has avoided making public endorsements for the last several elections, Bloomberg reported.
He did, though, call Trump’s reaction to the assassination attempt “badass” during an interview with Bloomberg in mid-July.
It is pertinent to note that a photo of Trump with his fist raised in the air was incorrectly appended with a fact-check label this week after other versions of that photo had been manipulated to show the Secret Service agents next to him smiling.
Meta automatically added a fact-check label to the doctored version of the photo, but the automated systems also added the label to the original by mistake.
After Trump’s interview, spokesman Andy Stone reiterated Zuckerberg’s stance. “Mark’s already been public about the fact that he’s not endorsing either candidate, just as he hasn’t in prior elections.”
(With Bloomberg inputs)
