
Facebook is not invited to white house social media summit: company
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Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg leaves the Elysee Palace after a meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron. Aurelien Meunier | French Select | Getty Images Facebook said on Monday that it
had not been invited to a White House summit on social media being held later this week. The White House has repeatedly declined to say who will attend the July 11 event. White House
spokesman Judd Deere said last month the meeting would "bring together digital leaders for a robust conversation on the opportunities and challenges of today's online
environment." He said on Monday that President Donald Trump will speak at the event. Several conservatives on social media have said they are attending the summit, including Bill
Mitchell, a Trump supporter who hosts an online show. At least two social media users posted photos of an invitation to the summit that said it will take place at 3 p.m. EDT (1900 GMT) on
Thursday. U.S. politicians, led by Trump, have increasingly used social media to try to woo voters directly. Trump has said on many occasions that he would not have been elected without
Twitter and Facebook. But Republican Trump has regularly attacked Facebook and Twitter as being "biased" in favor of Democrats, without offering evidence. He suggested in a Fox
Business Network interview last month that Twitter made it "very hard for people to join me at Twitter... and they make it very much harder for me to get out the message." In
March, Trump tweeted that "Facebook, Google and Twitter, not to mention the Corrupt Media, are sooo on the side of the Radical Left Democrats. But fear not, we will win anyway, just
like we did before!" All three companies have denied political bias. When asked if it had been invited to Thursday's meeting, a spokesman for Facebook said in an emailed reply that
it had not. Twitter declined to say on Monday if it had been invited to the summit or would take part. Alphabet's Google unit did not immediately respond to a request for comment on
whether it had been invited. In April, Trump met with Twitter Chief Executive Jack Dorsey and spent a significant time questioning him about why he had lost some Twitter followers, a person
briefed on the matter told Reuters. With more than 61 million followers, Trump has one of the most-followed accounts on Twitter.