WASHINGTON (Diya TV) — Former Facebook executive Sarah Wynn-Williams delivered explosive testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday, accusing Meta Platforms Inc. of compromising U.S. national security in its effort to expand its business in China.

Wynn-Williams, who served as Facebook’s director of global public policy from 2011 until her termination in 2017, alleged that senior Meta executives misled employees, Congress, shareholders, and the public about the company’s dealings with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). According to her prepared remarks, Meta executives shared information about U.S. artificial intelligence initiatives with Chinese officials in hopes of gaining access to the Chinese market.

“We are engaged in a high-stakes AI arms race against China,” she testified. “And during my time at Meta, company executives lied about what they were doing with the Chinese Communist Party.”

Wynn-Williams’ appearance comes amid heightened scrutiny of Meta’s business practices, as the company prepares to face a major antitrust trial brought by the Federal Trade Commission that could force it to divest Instagram and WhatsApp.

The hearing also coincides with the release of Wynn-Williams’ new book, Careless People, which recounts her years inside the social media giant. The book has already sold over 60,000 copies in its first week and climbed into Amazon’s top 10 best-seller list. During the hearing, Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) said Meta engaged in a “campaign of threats and intimidation” to suppress the book and silence Wynn-Williams.

Among her most serious claims, Wynn-Williams alleged that Meta deleted the Facebook account of Chinese dissident and billionaire Guo Wengui at the request of the CCP. She claimed this was part of Meta’s broader strategy to align with Beijing. In response, Meta said Guo’s account was removed for violating the company’s policies by sharing personally identifiable information such as Social Security and passport numbers, a claim first reported by CNN.

Wynn-Williams also criticized Meta for its proposed involvement in the Pacific Light Cable Network — a project that would have created a high-speed internet link between the U.S. and China. She warned that such a connection could have provided Beijing with a “backdoor” into U.S. user data. Though the project was ultimately abandoned, Wynn-Williams credited congressional intervention, not internal oversight, for halting the plan.

Meta denied the allegations in a public statement, saying Wynn-Williams’ testimony is “divorced from reality and riddled with false claims.” The company acknowledged previous interest in offering services in China, but noted it does not operate in the country today. “Mark Zuckerberg himself was public about our interest in China and those efforts were widely reported beginning over a decade ago,” the company said.

Zuckerberg, along with other Big Tech executives, has recently tried to improve relations with the Trump administration, making appearances at Mar-a-Lago, the White House, and donating to political causes. Whether those efforts will benefit Meta in the long run remains unclear.

Wynn-Williams painted a scathing portrait of Zuckerberg’s leadership. “This is a man who wears many different costumes,” she told lawmakers. “When I was there, he wanted the president of China to name his first child, he was learning Mandarin, he was censoring to his heart’s content. Now his new costume is MMA fighting or free speech. We don’t know what the next costume is gonna be, but it will be something different. It’s whatever gets him closest to power.”

The Senate hearing signals a growing bipartisan effort to hold Big Tech accountable for its global influence and potential conflicts with national interests. Whether Wynn-Williams’ claims will lead to legislative action or affect Meta’s legal standing remains to be seen, but her testimony adds fuel to an already raging debate over Silicon Valley’s role in geopolitics and national security.