For a long time, the leading tech companies have been in fierce competition with one another (who could forget the time Zuckerberg and Musk were rumored to face off in a cage fight?). Now, however, they are uniting in support of the president — as well as their own agendas, writes
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Your backing truly matters.On January 20, the three wealthiest individuals on the planet will gather in a space smaller than a Mini Cooper.
That is according to NBC News, which reported on Tuesday that "first buddy" Elon Musk, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, and Facebook and Instagram boss Mark Zuckerberg will be seated together on the platform at Donald Trump's inauguration in Washington D.C.
These three individuals, boasting a collective estimated net worth of $860 billion, are hardly the best of friends. They have frequently engaged in public disputes, both in their professional dealings and personal lives.
However, authoritarian leaders often align with unexpected partners, and in the past few months, all three individuals have submitted to Trump's influence.
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Consider Musk and Bezos, who have dedicated years to a covert competition in the realm of space exploration. Their companies, SpaceX and Blue Origin, have consistently vied for federal contracts related to space launches.
The two men reportedly clashed as early as 2004, when they met over dinner to discuss the space industry. "[I told him,] 'dude, we tried that and that turned out to be really dumb, so don't do the dumb thing we did'," Musk later recalled. "I actually did my best to give good advice, which he largely ignored.”
In 2013, Blue Origin filed a lawsuit aimed at stopping SpaceX from utilizing one of NASA's launchpads, a move that Musk criticized as a "fake obstruction strategy."
The competition intensified in 2019, with both individuals escalating their jabs at one another through public remarks and social media interactions. Bezos ridiculed Musk's ambitions to establish a colony on Mars, whereas Musk labeled Bezos a "copycat" for his intentions to create a network of low Earth orbit satellites that resembled Musk's Starlink initiative.
The two companies continued to battle in court, while Musk accused Bezos of "taking himself a bit too seriously" and criticized Amazon's Lord of the Rings TV series for being sexist against men.
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Next, we have the peculiar and prolonged feud between Musk and Zuckerberg, the head of Meta. The tension escalated in 2016 when a malfunctioning SpaceX rocket destroyed one of Facebook's satellites during a launch. In response, Zuckerberg criticized Musk's skeptical stance on AI, labeling it as "irresponsible."
In 2018, Musk participated in the #DeleteFacebook movement by shutting down the Facebook accounts of his companies, jokingly asking, "What even is Facebook?"
Things got weirder in 2023, after Musk got into the social media market by buying Twitter and renaming it X. Harsh words over Facebook's trustworthiness, and Instagram's attempt to poach users from X, escalated into a planned mixed martial arts cage match between the two men.
"Musk tweeted that 'Zuck is a cuck,' suggesting a 'literal dick-measuring contest.' Fortunately, this showdown never took place, and the anticipated cage match also fell through, with both men pointing fingers at one another."
Nevertheless, in the world of business, pragmatism prevails, and it appears that all three individuals have come to the conclusion that cultivating a relationship with Trump serves their interests.
Bezos intervened with the Washington Post (the newspaper he owns) to spike a planned election endorsement of Kamala Harris, though he insisted this had nothing to do with Trump. He later donated $1 million to Trump's inauguration fund and visited him at Mar-a-Lago.
Zuckerberg, meanwhile, has unveiled a raft of Trump-friendly reforms at his company Meta and appointed a Trump ally to his board. Having spent 2020 selling himself as a heartfelt progressive, he then went on Joe Rogan to decry Meta's "masculine energy" at his company (which is 63 percent women). Both Amazon and Meta have also said they will axe diversity programs.
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Musk's MAGA transformation, of course, is well known — as are his massive financial donations to Trump's campaign and his influence over the coming White House.
One tech baron not mentioned in NBC's report was Apple CEO Tim Cook, whom Trump once called "Tim Apple". While Cook, who is gay, has personally donated to Trump's inauguration and devoted great effort to improving his relationship with Trump, his company has defended its diversity policies against a conservative challenge.
So when Trump is sworn in next week,these tech barons will sit united in little but the sprawling scale of their business interests and their shared willingness to pay obeisance to a man described by 14 of his own former officials as a power-hungry fascist.
I can't shake the feeling that placing them side by side is a calculated move by the ever-loyalty-minded Trump (or perhaps one of his staff) — intended to demonstrate to the public that these three influential figures are ready to set aside their disagreements for a common goal.
Wouldn't it be fascinating to be the federal agent tasked with listening in on their discussion?
