It’s Not a SpaceX Rocket, but Zuckerberg Impressed Trump With His New High-Tech Smart Glasses
In the battle of the billionaire tech bros for the president-elect’s favor, Meta’s CEO made a personal pitch.
President-elect Donald Trump was reportedly wowed by Mark Zuckerberg’s personal demonstration of his hot new high-tech smart glasses in what could be a sign of warming relations between the two.
Mr. Zuckerberg has been viewed skeptically by Trump and conservatives who believe Facebook suppresses their content. The president-elect even posted on Truth Social over the summer that the Meta executive could spend the rest of his life in prison if his social media platforms took any actions perceived as hurting his campaign.
However, on Wednesday, there were signs that the relationship between the two men may be growing closer as they dined together.
During the meeting at Mar-a-Lago, Mr. Zuckerberg impressed Trump with a demonstration of Meta’s sleek smart glasses. Axios reported the demonstration was a “hit” with the president-elect.
The glasses, made with trendy Ray-Ban frames, can act as regular glasses or sunglasses. They are also integrated with several high-tech features such as Meta AI, which wearers can use to answer questions or get other information, cameras that can record or be used for video calls and speakers to play music or podcasts. The glasses can project certain graphics onto the lenses so users can see video calls or other information as they go about their day.
While the purpose of the meeting was to focus on the incoming administration, the demonstration has the potential to boost sales of the Meta glasses if Trump was thoroughly impressed by them.
During his first term, Trump not so subtly promoted several brands from the White House. In 2019, he welcomed the North Dakota State football team to the White House with a spread of hundreds of Big Macs and chicken sandwiches from McDonald’s while offering his endorsement of “all-American restaurants.” In 2020, he endorsed Goya Foods, the largest Hispanic-owned food company in America, after its chief executive praised him. Amid a boycott effort, Goya saw a 22 percent sales increase after the president’s backing.
More recently, Trump became fond of telling the story of watching SpaceX, owned by billionaire Elon Musk, successfully launch its Starship rocket and, for the first time, “catch” its more than 20-story booster on reentry to be able to re-use it. During rallies, Trump would frequently tell the story with his typical flare and hand motions to simulate the booster’s descent.
Mr. Musk also owns X, a competitor to Meta, and became a major supporter of Trump during the campaign. He is believed to have contributed more than $200 million dollars through his political action committee to help elect Trump. Mr. Musk has become a regular fixture at Mar-a-Lago and was tapped to lead the new advisory panel named the Department of Government Efficiency.
As Mr. Musk has apparently developed a warm relationship with Trump, Mr. Zuckerberg and other tech executives have been trying to improve their ties with the president-elect, often with attempts at flattery and knocks against his opponents in the hopes it will help their businesses with the new administration.
Mr. Zuckerberg has said Facebook made a mistake in 2020 in cooperating with Democrats to censor news stories about Hunter Biden’s laptop, and called Trump’s response to the assassination attempt in July “badass.”