Mark Zuckerberg Recommended Staff for Pete Buttigieg's Campaign

Has Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg been advising out presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg?

Bloomberg reports the tech billionaire recommended several hires for the insurgent Democratic candidate's campaign. Buttigieg spokesperson Chris Meagher confirmed to the outlet both that Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan, had offered staff recommendations. Chan is a pediatrician and cofounder of the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative.

At least two of the individuals recommended by the couple to Campaign Manager Mike Schmuhl were then hired, Bloomberg reports.

A representative for Buttigieg told The Advocate the campaign received a single unsolicited job recommendation from Zuckerberg and another from Chan. Those came at a time the campaign was reviewing 7,000 applications amid a tremendous expansion.

A spokesman for Zuckerberg and Chan said the two employees hired had asked for the job recommendations.

"Having seen Mark's visit to South Bend in 2017 and Facebook Live with Mayor Buttigieg, colleagues later asked Mark and Priscilla to connect them with the Buttigieg campaign as they were interested in joining," said Zuckerberg-Chan spokesman Ben LaBolt.

Buttigieg's campaign responded to sudden media interest in the hires by stressing the campaign does not work closely with Zuckerberg. Buttigieg himself has been a strong critic of Facebook.

"Pete is still close with Chris Hughes from his Harvard days, who is a strong and vocal critic of Facebook, and Pete has been firm about how we need to hold Facebook accountable, including on federal regulation, data privacy, and more," said Sean Savett, a director for Buttigieg's rapid response team. Hughes was a cofounder of Facebook.

Savette also stressed the two employees hired are among 430 staff nationally, 50 percent of whom are women, 40 percent of whom are people of color, and 28 percent of whom are LGTBQ.

Zuckerberg has not donated to any presidential campaigns this year but has a history of supporting both Democratic and Republican candidates for Congress. According to OpenSecrets, Zuckerberg donated $7,800 to New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker in 2013. Booker is also running for the Democratic nomination for president.

But Zuckerberg has also donated to other candidates of varying political values. Those include Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer, both Democrats, as well as Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, Utah Sen. Orrin Hatch, and former Speakers Paul Ryan and John Boehner, all Republicans.

The most recent federal candidate donation he made was in 2017, to Democrat Katie Porter, who unseated a Republican incumbent in a California congressional district last year.

LaBolt stressed that recommended individuals for jobs with the Buttigieg campaign should not be read as an endorsement.

"Mark and Priscilla have not decided who to support for President," he told Bloomberg.

Prior to running for office, the two men did overalap while both attending Harvard University and the South Bend mayor was friends with the Facebook founder's roommates at the time. He was also one of the first 300 users of the social media platform developed by Zuckerberg.