Billionaires, Tech CEOs at Trump Inauguration: Bezos, Zuckerberg, Musk

• Donald Trump was sworn in because the forty seventh president of the USA on Monday.
• Large names in enterprise and tech attended the inauguration and different weekend celebrations.
• Listed here are the billionaires and CEOs who attended Trump’s inaugural ceremony Monday.

Donald Trump was sworn in as president of the USA for the second time on Monday, and key enterprise and tech leaders have been there to observe it occur — and to attempt to get in his good graces.

It is a shift from latest years, when Large Tech leaders and Trump and different conservatives appeared extra at odds.

A number of of them even sat on the inaugural platform, getting higher seats than a few of Trump’s cupboard appointees.

Tesla’s Elon Musk, Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg, Google’s Sundar Pichai, and Amazon’s Jeff Bezos have been amongst these seated on the inaugural platform. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, for instance, reportedly watched from the overflow room.

Listed here are the billionaires and CEOs who attended Trump’s inauguration.

Elon Musk, Tesla, SpaceX, and X

Elon Musk, the Tesla and SpaceX CEO who spent tons of of tens of millions of {dollars} to elect Trump, attended the inauguration and spoke at an inaugural rally Monday.

Musk has steadily been to Trump’s Florida property, Mar-a-Lago, within the weeks since Trump was elected.

Trump tapped Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy to guide a brand new Division of Authorities Effectivity, although Ramaswamy confirmed Monday he is leaving DOGE.

Mark Zuckerberg, Meta

Zuckerberg and his spouse, Priscilla Chan, attended the inauguration an sat on the platform.

In a while Monday, he posted a photograph on Instagram of himself and Chan dressed for an inauguration occasion with the caption “Optimistic and celebrating,” alongside an American flag emoji.

Meta was one of many first main companies to donate $1 million to Trump’s inauguration fund, and the corporate has began 2025 with a slew of modifications that look like influenced by Trump’s politics.

CEO Mark Zuckerberg dined with Trump at Mar-a-Lago in November and is “very eager to play an energetic position” within the president’s tech policymaking, in accordance with Meta’s then-global affairs chief, Nick Clegg.

Although Zuck did not endorse a candidate for president, he mentioned Trump’s response to being shot at a Pennsylvania rally this summer season was “badass.”

Trump was a vocal critic of Fb in his first time period and earlier this yr threatened to jail Zuckerberg if re-elected.

Sundar Pichai, Google

Google CEO Sundar Pichai was additionally in attendance Monday.

Google was among the many firms that donated $1 million to Trump’s inaugural fund.

Jeff Bezos, Amazon

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and his fiancée, Lauren Sanchez, reportedly met with Trump at Mar-a-Lago in December for dinner, joined by Elon Musk. Amazon additionally donated $1 million to Trump’s inaugural fund.

Bezos is “truly very optimistic” about one other Trump time period and wish to assist him with “lowering regulation,” he mentioned at The New York Instances’ DealBook Summit final month.

“What I’ve seen thus far is he’s calmer than he was the primary time and extra settled,” he mentioned. “You have most likely grown within the final eight years. He has, too.”

Bezos did not all the time really feel this fashion about Trump. In 2016, he mentioned Trump’s want to lock up Hillary Clinton or refuse to simply accept a loss within the presidential election that yr “erodes our democracy across the edges.”

Trump has criticized Amazon and The Washington Submit, which Bezos owns, steadily over time.

In 2024, for the primary time in a long time, The Washington Submit did not publish an endorsement of a presidential candidate. Bezos reportedly intervened to dam an endorsement of Kamala Harris that had already been drafted.

Bezos later defended the choice, writing in an op-ed that endorsements “create a notion of bias” and “do nothing to tip the scales of an election.”

Tim Prepare dinner, Apple

Not like a few of his friends, Apple CEO Tim Prepare dinner — higher identified to Trump as “Tim Apple” — made a $1 million donation to Trump’s inaugural fund from his personal pockets, not his firm’s.

Prepare dinner has credited the primary Trump administration with serving to Apple break into the retail market in India.

Sam Altman, OpenAI

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman additionally made a private donation of $1 million to Trump’s inaugural fund.

Altman agrees with a few of Trump’s views round bureaucratic blockades.

“The factor I actually deeply agree with the president on is, it’s wild how troublesome it has develop into to construct issues in the USA,” Altman instructed Bloomberg earlier this month. “Energy vegetation, information facilities, any of that form of stuff. I perceive how bureaucratic cruft builds up, however it’s not useful to the nation on the whole.”

Shou Zi Chew, TikTok

Within the wake of Trump’s efforts to reverse the latest ban on TikTok, Shou Zi Chew, the app’s CEO, was additionally noticed within the Capitol Rotunda.

TikTok was briefly down within the US this weekend after the Supreme Court docket upheld a ban on it, however the app got here again on-line after a number of hours.

Chew mentioned in a subsequent TikTok, “I wish to thank President Trump for his dedication to work with us to discover a answer that retains TikTok accessible in the USA.”

Rupert Murdoch, NewsCorp

Rupert Murdoch, patriarch of the Fox Information empire, was additionally current Monday.

Bernard Arnault, LVMH

French billionaire Bernard Arnault, the CEO of luxurious conglomerate LVMH, which incorporates manufacturers like Louis Vuitton and Dior, attended the inauguration.

He was joined by daughter Delphine Arnault, who’s CEO of Dior, and son Alexandre Arnault, who will develop into deputy CEO of LVMH’s wines and spirits division, Moët Hennessy, beginning in February.

Dana White, UFC

Silicon Valley’s rising alignment with the cultural MAGA-verse was on show Monday.

In attendance on the inauguration was Dana White, president and CEO of UFC, who was lately appointed to the board of Meta and is a Trump ally.

White and Meta’s Zuckerberg, whose hobbies embrace MMA preventing, have been noticed collectively a number of occasions over time.

Podcaster Theo Von, one of many web celebrities Trump used to court docket younger male voters, was on the inauguration, too, representing an ascendant realm of right-wing media.

Joe Rogan, who interviewed Trump on his common podcast in late October and Zuckerberg earlier this month, additionally attended from the Rotunda.

Miriam Adelson, Las Vegas Sands

Miriam Adelson, the widow of on line casino magnate Sheldon Adelson, was additionally in attendance.

In keeping with the Related Press, the longtime GOP megadonor co-hosted a reception for Trump on Monday night time alongside Zuckerberg; Tilman Fertitta, Trump’s decide for US ambassador to Italy; Todd Ricketts, co-owner of the Chicago Cubs; and Ricketts’ spouse, Sylvie Légère.

Phil Ruffin, Circus Circus Resort and On line casino

Las Vegas on line casino magnate Phil Ruffin attended the inauguration together with his spouse, Oleksandra Nikolayenko. Trump had served as Ruffin’s finest man when he married Nikolayenko in 2008.

Mukesh Ambani, Reliance Industries

Mukesh Ambani, the chairman of the conglomerate Reliance Industries, attended Trump’s inauguration together with his spouse Nita, a spokesperson for Ambani confirmed with Enterprise Insider.

The couple additionally attended Trump’s pre-inauguration reception in Washington on Saturday.

Outdoors of Washington, D.C., responses from the company world additionally poured in on-line, too.

Pichai, Prepare dinner, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, and former New York Metropolis mayor Michael Bloomberg have been amongst these congratulating Trump on X, previously often known as Twitter, on Monday.

Correction: January 20, 2025 — An earlier model of this story misstated Jeff Bezos’ present place at Amazon. He’s the founder and govt chairman, not the CEO.