AceShowbiz - During the April 5 Breakthrough Prizes ceremony backed by tech moguls and aimed at celebrating significant scientific advancements, actor Seth Rogen aimed a pointed joke at President Donald Trump, who has found strong supporters in the tech community.

Rogen was on stage with actor Edward Norton to present a special prize and made remarks about the irony of celebrating science while some attendees had supported a presidential administration criticized for its stance on scientific matters.

Rogen allegedly quipped, "It's amazing that others in this room underwrote electing a man who, in the last week, single-handedly destroyed all of American science." He followed this up with, "It's amazing how much good science you can destroy with $320 million and RFK Jr., very fast."

This statement, aimed at the supporters of President Trump present in the audience, was later cut from the official recordings of the event.

The Breakthrough Prizes, founded in 2013 by notable figures such as Google's Sergey Brin and Meta's Mark Zuckerberg, released a statement to The Hollywood Reporter, justifying the edit by claiming it was done "in order to meet the originally planned run time."

This reasoning has been met with skepticism. Given that the ceremony, which was streamed online and thus had no broadcasting schedule constraints, runs nearly 100 minutes and the standalone clip of Rogen and Norton shouldn't have necessitated specific time edits.

Adding to the intrigue, it's worth noting that both Zuckerberg and Brin interacted with Trump post-2024 election and celebrated the win at Mar-a-Lago, Florida. Further, another tech mogul Elon Musk, who has faced scrutiny for his involvement with Trump's recent governmental endeavors, attended last year's Breakthrough event.

The Breakthrough Prize Rogen and Norton presented went to Gerardus 't Hooft, a distinguished Dutch theoretical physicist acknowledged for his work in quantum field theory.