Mark Zuckerberg was reportedly asked to wait outside the Oval Office and leave the room so that Donald Trump’s meeting could continue.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg was reportedly asked to leave US President Donald Trump’s Oval Office at the White House after he walked into a meeting of the Republican leader with high-ranking military officials.
According to sources quoted in an NBC News report, military leaders were shocked when Zuckerberg crashed into the Oval Office during a discussion on the Air Force’s next-generation fighter jet platform. It is not clear exactly when the alleged incident happened.
The report said that officials were concerned about Zuckerberg’s presence as he did not have the security clearance to participate in the conversation. He was asked to wait outside the Oval Office and leave the room so that the meeting could continue.
Officials in the meeting were ‘mystified and a bit unnerved’ with the lack of privacy in the Oval Office. One official even referred to the meeting as ‘bizarro world,’ the NBC report added.
White House official contradicts Mark Zuckerberg ouster claims
According to a report by the Daily Mail, a senior White House official pushed back on the claims that Mark Zuckerberg was asked to leave the Oval Office, saying reports about the incident ‘mischaracterised’ what exactly happened.
Zuckerberg ‘popped in to say hello at the President’s request, and then left to wait for his meeting with POTUS to begin, which was scheduled to occur after the meeting with the pilots,’ the unnamed official said on the matter.
Mark Zuckerberg has had a complicated history with politics. He was the voice of pro-immigration policies and supported liberal politicians from the Democratic Party before pivoting towards the Make America Great Again (MAGA) agenda during Donald Trump‘s re-election campaign last year.
Zuckerberg even attended Trump’s inauguration in January along with fellow billionaires Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk, who was close aide to Trump before his public fallout with the President in recent times.
The article originally appeared on Hindustan Times
