Former President Donald Trump appeared to express regret Friday that he ever hosted Mark Zuckerberg at the White House for dinner after Facebook announced the former president would be suspended for two more years.
“Next time I’m in the White House there will be no more dinners, at his request, with Mark Zuckerberg and his wife,” Trump wrote in a statement sent to reporters. “It will be all business!”
The former president’s statement immediately sparked curiosity from reporters who wondered if his statement confirmed that he planned to run again in 2024.
Trump issued his statement after Facebook announced its decision to ban him for two more years.
Facebook detailed a new set of rules to govern public officials on their platform, warning that Trump posed a “serious risk to public safety.”
“Given the gravity of the circumstances that led to Mr. Trump’s suspension, we believe his actions constituted a severe violation of our rules which merit the highest penalty available under the new enforcement protocols,” the statement from Facebook read.
The former president hosted Zuckerberg for dinner at the White House in October 2019 and also met with Zuckerberg in the Oval Office in September 2019.
Trump’s personal meetings with tech executives like Zuckerberg and Twitter’s Jack Dorsey frustrated conservatives who wanted to see the president take a tougher line on big tech companies who were censoring, shadow banning, and de-platforming conservatives.
But the former president made it clear he no longer has an interest in working with any of the major big tech CEOs.
“Facebook’s ruling is an insult to the record-setting 75M people, plus many others, who voted for us in the 2020 Rigged Presidential Election,” he wrote. “They shouldn’t be allowed to get away with this censoring and silencing, and ultimately, we will win. Our Country can’t take this abuse anymore!”