When tech billionaires and politicians throw around dollar figures beyond our imagination, what are they drawing upon, exactly? Their own imaginations, most likely.
At least that seemed to be the case this week, when Mark Zuckerberg sat next to Donald Trump at a White House meeting of the biggest tech, AI and crypto moguls in America including Tim Cook, Sam Altman and Bill Gates (Notably absent: Elon Musk).
MSNBC “The Weekend” anchor Jackie Alemany had a hearty giggle at an edit showing Cook, Altman and Gates all gushing at the president as they took turns speaking from around a large table, thanking him for the invitation and his business-friendly leadership.
“The dinner comes as big tech pushes for a hands-off approach to AI from the government,” Alemany said. “And in a scene reminiscent of one of Trump’s Cabinet meetings, each billionaire took turns showering him with praise.”
But anchor Eugene Daniels was particularly interested in the moment when Zuckerberg, seated directly to Trump’ right, was asked by the president how much Meta would be spending in the U.S. over the next few years.
“Oh, gosh,” Zuckerberg began, hesitating. “I mean, I think it’s probably going to be something like, I don’t know, at least $600 billion through ’28 in the U.S., yeah.”
“It’s a lot,” Trump replied.
Moments later – and with the mics still on – Trump came back to the topic, though it appears Zuckerberg didn’t know his audio was being recorded.
“It’s — it’s significant,” Zuckerberg said. “Sorry, I wasn’t ready to do a — a big announcement. I wasn’t — I wasn’t sure what number you wanted.”
And with that, the veil had been lifted, as Daniels took note.
“It’s like, these men are not in business together!” Daniels said. “They’re not supposed to be. The president has his hands so much in how some of these folks are operating. … But should the president be kind of as involved as it seems like he might be.”
Watch the entire exchange in the video above.
