This is the latest case of a major corporation settling litigation with the president, who has threatened to retaliate against his critics and rivals, and comes at a time when Meta and its CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, have joined other big tech companies in trying to curry favor with the new Trump administration.
The individuals familiar with the matter spoke on Wednesday on condition of anonymity to discuss the agreement. Two of the individuals said the terms of the settlement include $22 million earmarked for the nonprofit organization that will become Trump's future presidential library. The rest will go towards legal fees and other litigants, they noted.
The Wall Street Journal was the first to report on the agreement.
Zuckerberg visited Trump in November at his Florida private club to try to reconcile with the incoming president, a move that other tech, business, and government officials have also made. During the dinner, Trump brought up the litigation issue and suggested they try to resolve it, sparking two months of negotiations between the parties, the individuals said.
Meta also made a $1 million donation to Trump's inauguration committee, and Zuckerberg was among several billionaires who secured front-row seats during Trump's inauguration last week at the Capitol Rotunda, alongside Google's Sundar Pichai, Amazon's Jeff Bezos, and Elon Musk, who now owns X platform, formerly known as Twitter.
Prior to Trump's inauguration, Meta announced it was scrapping fact-checking on its platform, a longtime priority for Trump and his allies.
Trump filed the lawsuit months after his first term ended, claiming that social media companies' actions were "illegal and shameful censorship of the American people."