Trump, Zuckerberg hold ‘constructive’ meeting at White House

President Trump met with Mark Zuckerberg at the White House on Thursday after the Facebook CEO and founder spent the afternoon talking with lawmakers on Capitol Hill.

“Mark is in Washington, D.C., meeting with policymakers to hear their concerns and talk about future internet regulation. He also had a good, constructive meeting with President Trump at the White House today,” a Facebook spokesperson said in a statement.

Trump later acknowledged the “nice” meeting on Twitter, including a photo of the pair shaking hands.

Nice meeting with Mark Zuckerberg of @Facebook in the Oval Office today. https://t.co/k5ofQREfOc pic.twitter.com/jNt93F2BsG

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 20, 2019

Trump has routinely criticized Facebook and other social media platforms, accusing them without evidence of harboring political biases against him.

“We should be suing Google and Facebook and all that, which perhaps we will,” Trump said during a Fox Business interview in June.{mosads}

Trump tweeted in March that Facebook, Google and Twitter are “sooo on the side of the Radical Left Democrats.”

And the president in July criticized the tech giant for its plan to launch a payments system next year, in which users exchange money through a proprietary cryptocurrency called Libra.

Thursday’s meeting between Trump and Zuckerberg was first reported by Bloomberg.

Zuckerberg has been in Washington, D.C., the past two days. He dined with Democrats on Wednesday night to discuss the role of social media platforms in elections and the protection of consumer data.

The CEO then held closed-door meetings on Thursday with influential Republican senators where he defended his company against accusations that it has amassed too much power, censored conservative voices and failed to adequately protect against election interference on the platform.

Facebook has faced a firestorm of criticism from lawmakers who worry that the platform is too powerful. It has also dealt with data breaches and revelations that millions of users saw advertisements that originated from Russia during the 2016 presidential campaign.

Updated: 8:30 p.m.