He gave no further details and was only briefly glimpsed by reporters on the Hill.
Twitter has faced intense scrutiny from both ends of the political spectrum over which voices are banned or promoted on the platform.
Asked about the meeting, McCarthy, who turned 58 on Thursday, declined to comment but quipped that Musk “came to wish me happy birthday,” adding “we’ve been friends for years.”
Representatives for both McCarthy and Jeffries did not immediately respond to an early Friday request for comment from The Washington Post.
Musk, who is also CEO of Tesla, previously championed McCarthy during the historic stalemate in the House speaker vote earlier this month, which saw him take up the gavel only after 15 rounds of ballots and days of internal Republican wrangling.
“Kevin McCarthy should be Speaker,” the tech billionaire tweeted at the time, lending his support to the California Republican. “If not McCarthy, then seriously who?” Musk added, prompting users to urge him to stay politically neutral.
In May 2022, Musk said he had previously voted Democrat but could “no longer support them” and would switch to the Republican Party instead.
McCarthy has also publicly supported Musk in the past, telling reporters last year that the Biden administration should “stop picking on Elon Musk” after President Biden said that aspects of Musk’s business dealings deserved scrutiny.
Since taking over Twitter, Musk has reinstated former president Donald Trump’s account, after a vote by users on the site. Trump has so far declined to tweet since being reinstated, opting to use his Truth Social platform instead. He has said he will not rejoin Twitter — but it remains unclear if he will stick to that as he launches his bid to return to the White House in 2024.
This week, social media behemoth Meta announced that it was also reinstating Trump’s accounts on Facebook and Instagram after a two-year suspension over his role in praising the rioters who stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, in an attack that left several dead and many injured.
Trump was impeached by the Democratic-controlled House on a charge of inciting an insurrection, although the Senate then acquitted him.
“The public should be able to hear what their politicians are saying — the good, the bad and the ugly — so that they can make informed choices at the ballot box,” Nick Clegg, Meta’s president of global affairs, said this week. “But that does not mean there are no limits to what people can say on our platform,” he added.
Social media companies have faced widespread criticism from conservatives in the United States and elsewhere, who argue that the companies went too far in silencing Trump. Many right-leaning leaders praised Musk for reinstating Trump and pledging to create laxer rules on content moderation. Democrats and some left-leaning advocacy groups however have opposed Trump’s reinstatement on social media platforms — one lawmaker argued that Meta’s recent decision gave Trump “a platform to do more harm.”
Social media platforms have struggled to balance the need to enable the public to view potentially newsworthy but divisive posts from world leaders, with their content moderation policies and the potentially harmful consequences of that rhetoric.
Naomi Nix contributed to this report.
