Mark Zuckerberg is still a few years away from being eligible to run for president, but that hasn't stopped Politico cofounder and former CEO Jim VandeHei from suggesting the Facebook CEO run on the "Innovation Party" ticket.
"Right now, millions of young people are turned on by a 74-old-year socialist scolding Wall Street; millions of others by a reality-TV star with a 1950s view of women. Why not recruit Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg or Sheryl Sandberg to head a third-party movement?" writes VandeHei in a Wall Street Journal op-ed.
To which the Twitterati say: What's VandeHei smoking? Zuckerberg, a billionaire running a tech company in a region known for runaway wealth, is by any reasonable person's definition not eligible to represent what VandeHei refers to as "Normal America." And even as the social media wunderkind improves his public speaking skills, many would say he still doesn't have the charisma to lead an entire nation.
remember when zuckerberg flushed away $100 million trying to fix newark schools? that dude should run for president
-- brian feldman (@bafeldman) April 26, 2016
how out of touch do you have to be to say 'mark zuckerberg for president' unironically though
-- ??
To others, however, the idea of Zuckerberg's name on a presidential ticket isn't just reasonable--it's "well, duh" obvious. Based on his involvement in politics up until now, it's seems almost inevitable that he'll want to take it further sooner or later.
I would not at all be surprised if Mark Zuckerberg becomes president https://t.co/qEFKl0J2L8
-- kate losse (@katelosse) April 26, 2016
the thing that bothers me most about the vendehei piece is that, as a PREDICTION, it's almost credible https://t.co/ESS5Wt7eDI
-- John Herrman (@jwherrman) April 26, 2016
Zuckerberg is increasingly known as much for pushing for immigration reform and facilitating global access to the Internet as he is heading up the largest social media platform in the world. He has political influence that he's more than willing to use, and he makes a point of drawing attention to with how he spends his billions as well as public statements he makes.
That said, it seems VandeHei may not have been so much urging Zuckerberg to run as he was commenting that the 2016 race is so outside the bounds of typical U.S. presidential elections that almost few twists in the narrative would be surprising at this point.
"I will even throw out a possible name for the movement: The Innovation Party. Who is against innovation, especially when winning campaigns are almost always about the future?" writes VandeHei. "All it needs is a candidate."
