Settlement seen as a big victory for the US president as Meta’s Zuckerberg bows to the new administration on a number of fronts.

Meta has agreed to pay United States President Donald Trump $25m to settle a lawsuit he filed against the company for suspending his accounts after the US Capitol attack in January 2021.

A Meta spokesman confirmed the settlement, with reports stating that $22m would fund Trump’s presidential library and the remainder going to legal fees and other litigants.

The battle dates back to 2021 when Meta’s Facebook and Instagram suspended Trump’s accounts following a speech in which he attributed his electoral defeat to widespread fraud, his claims prompting insurrection by his supporters.

Trump said he had been wrongfully censored, and went on to file lawsuits against Twitter (since renamed X), Facebook, Google, and their chief executives in July 2021, alleging that they unlawfully silenced conservative viewpoints.

But he has recently courted tech titans, including Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and the new X owner, Elon Musk, both of whom attended Trump’s presidential inauguration last week in Washington, DC.

Zuckerberg was among several billionaires granted prime seating during Trump’s swearing-in last week. He has also tweaked Meta’s policies, announcing a rollback of fact-checking and moderation operations on the company’s apps, which include Facebook, Instagram and Threads.

Meta’s diversity, equity and inclusion programmes were also halted in January.

The social media giant has named prominent Republican Joel Kaplan as its chief global affairs officer and elected Dana White, CEO of Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) and close friend of Trump, to its board.

In a departure from its past practice, Meta went on to announce a $1m contribution to Trump’s inaugural fund back in December.

On Wednesday, it reported its net income soared by 59 percent to $62.36bn in 2024.