President Trump has signed settlement papers that will require Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta to pay roughly $25 million to resolve a 2021 lawsuit Trump filed after the company suspended his accounts on Facebook and Instagram.
The Wall Street Journal reports that President Donald Trump has reached a settlement agreement with Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta, formerly known as Facebook, to resolve a lawsuit filed by Trump in 2021. The suit was brought after Meta blacklisted the president’s Facebook and Instagram accounts in 2020. Under the terms of the agreement, Meta is expected to pay approximately $25 million, with $22 million earmarked for Trump’s presidential library fund and the remainder covering legal fees and other costs associated the case. Notably, Meta will not be required to admit any wrongdoing as part of the settlement.
The path to this settlement began with a dinner meeting between Trump and Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg at the president’s Mar-a-Lago club in November. This meeting was part of a broader effort by Zuckerberg and Meta to mend relations with the Trump administration, including a $1 million donation to Trump’s inaugural fund. During the dinner, Trump signaled that the lawsuit needed to be resolved before Zuckerberg could be “brought into the tent.”
Trump has seen a shift in recent weeks as corporations rush to establish connections with the new administration. In December, ABC News settled a defamation suit brought by Trump, agreeing to pay $15 million to his library. Paramount Global executives have also discussed settling a lawsuit over a CBS News interview with former Vice President Kamala Harris.
The Meta lawsuit was one of several legal actions taken by Trump against social media companies that suspended his accounts in 2021. Similar suits were filed against Twitter (now known as X) and Google’s YouTube, along with their corporate leaders. While the Twitter suit was dismissed and the Google suit administratively closed, Trump’s lawyers have worked to capitalize on the momentum of recent settlements.
As part of the agreement, Trump signed the settlement papers in the Oval Office on Wednesday.
Read more at the Wall Street Journal here.
Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of free speech and online censorship.
