Facebook Vice President for Global Public Policy Joel Kaplan and Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg leave the Elysée presidential palace after a meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron on May 23, 2018 in Paris, France .
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Parent Facebook Meta is replacing its president of global affairs, Nick Clegg, with Joel Kaplan, the company’s current vice president of politics and a former member of the Republican Party.
The shakeup comes three weeks before President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration, and it’s the latest sign of how tech companies are positioning themselves for a new administration in Washington.
Clegg, Britain’s former deputy prime minister, has announced his resignation, citing the new year as the right time to move on. He will be replaced by Kaplan, who will assume the title of director of global affairs.
Kaplan was deputy White House chief of staff under former President George W. Bush, and he appeared on the New York Stock Exchange. with Vice President-elect JD Vance and Trump in December. He also attended Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation hearing in 2018. as a personal friendprovoking a controversy for the social media company.
“I look forward to spending a few months passing the baton and representing the company at several international gatherings in the first quarter of this year,” Clegg wrote in a memo to his team. he shared on Facebook THURSDAY.
Clegg joined the company in 2018 after a career in British politics in the Liberal Democrat party, and he helped Meta deal with incredible scrutiny, particularly over the company’s influence on elections and its efforts to control harmful content.
Clegg also helped the company navigate the Cambridge Analytica scandal, in which Facebook shared user data with third-party political consultants. He has also represented the company in Washington and London, frequently on artificial intelligence panels and at congressional hearings.
“My time at the company coincided with a significant reset of the relationship between ‘big tech’ and the societal pressures manifest in new laws, institutions and standards affecting the sector,” Clegg wrote.
In his memo, Clegg said Kevin Martin, former chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, would replace Kaplan as Meta’s vice president of global policy. He mentioned that Kaplan would work closely with David Ginsburg, the company’s vice president of global communications and public affairs.
“Nick: I’m grateful for everything you’ve done for Meta and the world over the past seven years,” Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in a statement. “You have… built a strong team to advance this work. I am delighted that Joel will take on this role soon, given his extensive experience and insight leading our policy work for many years.”
Semafor first reported the news.
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