‘Who the f**k do these people think they are?’: Alastair Campbell smashes Zuck and Musk

One of the world’s most influential political commentators has lashed out at Mark Zuckerberg, accusing him of crawling up Donald Trump’s ‘backside’.

One of the world’s most influential podcasters has taken a swing at Mark Zuckerberg, accusing him of following fellow tech titan Elon Musk up Donald Trump’s “backside”, then asking: “Who the f**k do these people think they are”?

Fiery political legend Alastair Campbell also slammed the tech giants for claiming to champion free speech but being eager to silence and correct others – and ridiculed their appearance at Trump’s inauguration.

Campbell’s outburst came on Wednesday, after Zuckerberg’s Meta – which is controversially getting rid of its fact-checkers – tackled Campbell’s co-host on The Rest Is Politics, Rory Stewart … for getting his facts wrong.

In a previous episode, former UK Conservative MP Stewart had bungled the number of fact-checkers being dropped, which led Meta to contact him with a rebuttal.

We’re here, that’s a fact ... Meta and Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla Chan arrive at the inauguration of Donald Trump on Monday.

On Wednesday, Stewart mentioned Meta’s communication and apologised – but his apology prompted an outburst from Campbell, who became world-famous for his take-no-prisoners approach as former Labour Prime Minister Tony Blair’s press chief.

“Well, I think you’re being unbelievably generous,” blasted Campbell. “I read the rebuttal that Meta sent, and it’s not the first time that they’ve complained about things that we’ve said. It always amazes me how these great champions and fighters for free speech really don’t like it when you say things about them that they don’t like. Now, you’ve been gracious enough to say that on a factual point, you said something that was incorrect and you’ve corrected that.

“But on the bigger political point, here at The Rest Is Politics, having seen the changes (at Facebook, which is owned by Meta) and also having seen the pathetic presentation of them by Zuckerberg, be honest. Just be honest. Say, ‘look, Elon Musk is ahead of the game on this. He’s right up Trump’s backside and I can’t afford to be too far behind him’. So I’m going to get in there as well. So yeah, I’m going to spend a load on his inauguration. I hope I’m going to sit in a couple of rows behind Melania and Barron and I’ll be on the TV.”

All the gang is here ... Elon Musk (centre) and Donald Trump’s son Barron Trump (right) with Donald Trump Jr and other members of the presidential coterie at the inauguration. Melania Trump and her hat are out of shot.

This was a reference to Zuckerberg’s appearance at Monday’s presidential inauguration in Washington, DC – where the Meta boss made headlines for apparently peeking down the dress of Jeff Bezos’ partner; while X owner Musk sparked his own unflattering coverage with a bizarre salute.

“Honestly, who the fuck do these people think they are?” Campbell concluded. “As if they haven’t got enough power and wealth as it is, they now have to control – these great believers in speech – what comes out of your mouth and my mouth.”

Campbell and Stewart are leaders in the podcast world, with The Rest Is Politics in the Top 20 shows worldwide on Apple Podcasts. Last month it named South Australian Premier Peter Malinauskas as “foreign politician of the year” for leading actions to limit social media access to teens.

On Wednesday’s show Campbell did add that he was always happy to be corrected when he gets a fact wrong, told the tech titans he “looks forward to their next missive” then quipped that he would “calm down and take a break”.

Leading their field ... The Rest Is Politics hosts Alastair Campbell (left) and Rory Stewart.

Stewart’s apology, which sparked the outburst, began when he Meta had got in touch “to challenge what I was saying” in the previous episode.

“And they’ve pointed out that I said that they were getting rid of 40,000-odd fact-checkers, and that this was not true, and that I had said they were getting rid of algorithms, and this was not true. So, let me firstly apologise. The answer is that I can’t stand up that figure, and I totally take down that figure.”

Originally published as ‘Who the f**k do these people think they are?’: Alastair Campbell smashes Zuck and Musk