Mark Zuckerberg said in a Facebook post on Monday that Meta has added Ultimate Fighting Championship CEO Dana White and two other executives to its board of directors.
Mehta will add Mr. White, a longtime friend of President-elect Donald J. Trump, to the social media company's executive team in a series of moves to strengthen ties with the incoming administration. Last week, the company revamped its top policy team, naming a longtime executive known for his ties to the Republican Party as head of global policy. Mehta also donated $1 million to Trump's inaugural fund.
White and Meta CEO Zuckerberg have bonded in recent years over their passion for professional martial arts, including mixed martial arts, and Zuckerberg will try his hand at martial arts starting in 2022.
“Dana is the president and CEO of UFC, where she built it into one of the most valuable, fastest-growing, and most popular sports companies in the world,” Zuckerberg wrote in the post. I mentioned it inside. “I have admired him as an entrepreneur and his ability to build such a beloved brand.”
In 2023, White tried to broker a cage match between Zuckerberg and Elon Musk, the billionaire owner of X, Tesla and SpaceX. Musk, who became a close ally of Trump, eventually withdrew from the fight, citing old injuries. He blamed Zuckerberg for not allowing him to fight later.
Meta, which owns Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, has created three new seats on its board of directors with this appointment, bringing the total number to 13. Zuckerberg said the company also added John Elkann, chief executive officer of European-based holding company Exor. The company, which controls Jeep and Ferrari, and Charlie Songhurst, a technology investor who previously worked at Microsoft and recently advised Meta on artificial intelligence projects.
“We have a huge opportunity in the future of AI, wearables and social media, and our board will help us achieve our vision,” Zuckerberg said.
In recent years, Meta has started making wearable technology such as gaming headsets and camera-equipped sunglasses. It's also joining the global AI race, launching its own generation system with “open source” code that anyone can freely copy, modify, and reuse.
Mehta has faced harsh criticism from Republicans over content moderation on social media platforms, which Trump and others say amounts to censorship of conservative voices. Some of the people the president-elect has tapped to regulate tech and other industries have promised to crack down on them as a result.
In recent weeks, Mr. Zuckerberg met with Mr. Trump at Mar-a-Lago, during which the tech executive congratulated the president-elect on his election victory.
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