Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has decided to refuse to endorse anyone in the 2024 election.
Zuckerberg, 40, said in an interview with Bloomberg that he doesn’t plan to play a major role in the 2024 election.
“I’ve done some things personally in the past,” he said, adding, “I’m not going to do that this time, and that includes not endorsing either candidate.”
Other technology leaders, including Elon Musk of Huawei, Tesla and SpaceX, have formally endorsed Trump following the assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump last Saturday during a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, in which Trump was shot in the ear and former fire chief Corey Comperatore, 50, was shot and killed while trying to protect his family from the gunfire.
The shooter, Thomas Matthew Crooks, 20, was shot and killed by a Secret Service sniper.
Former Democratic donors such as Palantir adviser Jacob Helberg and Sequoia Capital partner Sean Maguire have also endorsed Trump, according to The Hill, while venture capitalists Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz have also endorsed Trump for president, according to Reuters.
Mark Zuckerberg speaks to reporters at the Prime Minister’s Office during a visit to Tokyo in February 2024. Zuckerberg declined to say who he would endorse in the 2024 election (Jiji Press/AFP via Getty Images)
While Zuckerberg declined to endorse Trump, he told Bloomberg, “Watching Donald Trump stand up after getting shot in the face, raise the American flag and pump his fist in the air was one of the coolest things I’ve ever seen in my life.”
He added: “In some ways, as an American, it’s hard not to identify with that spirit and that fighting spirit. I think that’s why so many people like him.”
Zuckerberg’s decision to stay out of politics during this election comes as Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, is also trying to limit political content on its platforms.
In February, Instagram announced that it would stop actively recommending political posts, and users who wanted to continue receiving recommendations for political content would have to change their settings.
“What we hear most often from people is that they would prefer less political content on our service, because they come to us to connect with people, and so that’s what we’re going to do,” Zuckerberg told Bloomberg.
“We give people the ability to control that, but we try to generally not recommend political content,” he added. “So I think our service will play a smaller role in this election than in past years.”
Mehta has repeatedly called out Trump for posts that contain misinformation or violate the platform’s rules. Nearly two years after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, Trump’s Facebook and Instagram accounts have been suspended, but he still appears to be upset about the move.
On July 9, Trump posted on Truth Social: “If I’m elected president, we will go after election fraudsters like never before and give them long prison sentences. We already know who you are. Don’t do it! Zuckerbucks, watch out!”
In a separate interview with Bloomberg, Trump reiterated his differences with Zuckerberg.
On regulating the tech industry, Trump said: “If you think about it, I support TikTok. We need competition. If you don’t have TikTok, you have Facebook, you have Instagram. And that’s, you know, Zuckerberg.”