Trump Scores $25 Million Settlement From Meta Over Suspended Accounts

Meta on Wednesday agreed to pay $25 million to settle President Donald Trump’s 2021 lawsuit against the tech giant for suspending his accounts on its social media platforms following the Jan. 6, 2021 Capitol riot, according to multiple reports.

The settlement follows Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta making a $1 million donation to Trump’s inaugural fund in an apparent attempt to align the company with the president. Meta, which owns Instagram and Facebook, will pay $22 million to a fund for Trump’s presidential library, while the remainder will go toward covering legal expenses and compensating additional plaintiffs involved with the case, company spokesperson Andy Stone confirmed, according to NBC News.

Stone asserted that the settlement does not mandate Meta to acknowledge any wrongdoing, NBC News, reported.

Social media platforms Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Google all suspended Trump after the Jan. 6 riot, which they claimed Trump incited. Facebook had reviewed Trump’s suspension in June 2021 and announced it would last until Jan. 7, 2023.

“We are today announcing new enforcement protocols to be applied in exceptional cases such as this, and we are confirming the time-bound penalty consistent with those protocols which we are applying to Mr. Trump’s accounts,” Facebook said in a June 2021 statement. “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.”

“We are suspending his accounts for two years, effective from the date of the initial suspension on January 7 this year,” it continued.

However, Trump’s Instagram and Facebook accounts were officially restored in February 2023, a Facebook spokesperson confirmed to the Daily Caller. Meta announced in July 2024 that it would lift Trump’s “heightened suspension penalties” on Facebook and Instagram as the election approached.