Trump team on Twitter: Meeting table ‘was only so big’
Donald Trump’s transition team said Wednesday that Twitter was not invited to the president-elect’s meeting with tech giants because the company isn’t big enough.
“Steve, the conference table was only so big, OK?” GOP strategist and Trump adviser Sean Spicer told MSNBC’s Steve Kornacki in an interview.
The transition spokesman and Republican National Committee communications director fired back after The Hill and other outlets reported that Twitter was not invited to the Wednesday meeting with tech leaders in retaliation for reneging on a deal.
A source alleged that Spicer was responsible for keeping Twitter out of the room after the San Francisco-based company pulled the plug on a $5 million deal with the Trump campaign.
CEO Jack Dorsey reportedly cut the deal over legal concerns, dropping Trump campaign-sponsored emojis that would have been used around the time of the second general election debate in October.
.@realDonaldTrump & @mike_pence meet with tech titans to discuss job creation and economic growth #MAGA pic.twitter.com/BCof5L9pcC
— Sean Spicer (@seanspicer) December 14, 2016
{mosads}“This was not an intentional slight … there was only so many people that can actually sit around a conference table,” Spicer said on MSNBC.
“So the idea that Twitter is that petty that they’re talking about that I, some press flack, has the authority to decide who Donald Trump will meet with is ridiculous.”
A transition team official also told Reuters that Twitter was excluded because “they aren’t big enough,” citing their market capitalization of $13.85 billion.
The next smallest company with a representative in attendance was Space X, whose rough valuation is $15 billion, however their representative — CEO Elon Musk — is also the CEO of Tesla Motors, whose market capitalization is over $30 billion.
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