Tech CEOs Meet President Trump: Inside the Summit
▼ Summary
– The dinner featured prominent tech executives like Mark Zuckerberg and Tim Cook pledging allegiance to Donald Trump at the White House.
– Trump asked each executive about their U.S. investments, and they praised his leadership while providing figures.
– Executives commended the administration’s AI policy, with Microsoft’s Nadella specifically highlighting Melania Trump’s involvement.
– Apple’s Tim Cook thanked Trump for enabling major U.S. investments, though the context suggested it was under tariff threats.
– Oracle’s Safra Catz enthusiastically praised Trump for unleashing American innovation, calling it the most exciting time in America.
The atmosphere in the State Dining Room was both formal and strangely disjointed. A long table separated the president from some of the most influential figures in technology, Mark Zuckerberg, Tim Cook, and Bill Gates among them, all gathered for an unusual evening of mutual praise and political theater. Broadcast live on C-SPAN, the event revealed a carefully orchestrated display of allegiance between Silicon Valley and the White House.
President Trump opened with remarks that blended flattery with characteristic vagueness, celebrating the executives as geniuses leading a business revolution. Within moments, the conversation shifted toward a familiar theme: financial commitments to the United States. One after another, the tech leaders detailed their companies’ domestic investments, often crediting the administration’s policies for making those investments possible.
Meta’s Zuckerberg announced plans to inject roughly $600 billion into U.S. infrastructure by 2028. Google co-founder Sergey Brin took a different tack, applauding the president’s foreign policy maneuvers in Venezuela just days after a controversial drone strike in the region. Others, including Microsoft’s Satya Nadella and AMD’s Lisa Su, focused their praise on the administration’s artificial intelligence initiatives, with Nadella even acknowledging First Lady Melania Trump for her work in AI education.
Apple’s Tim Cook expressed gratitude for what he described as a favorable environment for major domestic spending, though critics might note that such “gratitude” came amid looming threats of tariffs on imported goods. Oracle’s Safra Catz offered some of the most effusive compliments of the night, declaring it “the most exciting time in America ever” and crediting the president with unleashing a wave of innovation.
Throughout the exchanges, the dynamic felt rehearsed and slightly surreal, competitors sharing a table, offering tributes to a leader whose relationship with the tech industry has often been strained. A brief, almost imperceptible reaction from Zuckerberg, a raised eyebrow caught on camera, hinted at the unspoken tensions lying just beneath the surface of the cordial gathering. After a joke about rumors concerning his health, President Trump invited questions from the press, closing a chapter in the ongoing dance between power and technology.
(Source: Wired)
