Here is why the likes of Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg and Tim Cook are all attending Trump’s inauguration today.
Some big names in the tech industry have made their appearances at Donald Trump’s inauguration today (January 20).
The likes of Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg, Amazon boss Jeff Bezos and Apple CEO Tim Cook were seen sitting together in a church service ahead of the ceremony for the president-elect.

Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk are among the tech leaders in attendance (Pool / Pool / Getty)
Other notable tech bros in attendance include Tesla boss Elon Musk, podcaster Joe Rogan, Google CEO Sundar Pichai and former executive chairman of Fox Corp Rupert Murdoch.
Musk had also appeared at a victory rally with Trump on the eve of the inauguration and has been very vocal of his support of the Republican candidate over the past few months.
Along with making multiple appearances at campaign rallies, the SpaceX CEO donated hundreds of millions of dollars to Trump’s re-election bid and was announced as the head of the new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
While not technically a government department, DOGE is expected to act as an outside advisor where Musk has promised to slash the federal budget by trillions of dollars.
On social media, DOGE has been associated with a meme coin by the same name, something that Musk has referenced himself on X, formerly Twitter.
Dogecoin, which was initially created as a joke, went viral in 2010 and features a design of a famous Shiba Inu dog.

Elon Musk has been particularly vocal with his support for Donald Trump (Pool / Pool / Getty)
Musk shared a meme of the dog on X, formerly Twitter, after pledging to make $2 trillion in cuts.
The billionaire also posted on X that ‘the merch will be [fire emojis]’.
Zuckerberg also seems to have become more aligned with Trump in recent months after his firm Meta made a $1 million donation to Trump’s inaugural fund.
Bezos is another tech bro who seems to have shown support for the president-elect.
Last year, the Amazon boss, who is also the owner of the Washington Post, put a stop to the paper making an endorsement for the Democratic nominee Kamala Harris.
Instead, Bezos made the decision for the paper to not make any endorsement for the election for the first time in 36 years.
Amazon also gave $1 million to Trump’s inaugural fund.
As for Apple’s Cook, he dined with Trump at his Mar-a-Lago home in December 2024 which may be part of the reason for his attendance at today’s event in Washington DC.
Featured Image Credit: Pool/Pool / Chip Somodevilla/Staff / Getty

Donald Trump’s second presidential inauguration reportedly has a star-studded guest list, with big names like Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and even Jake Paul set to attend.
Many of America’s richest and most influential individuals are set to travel to Washington D.C. for president-elect Donald Trump‘s inauguration, which is a contrast to his first one eight years ago to the day.
Trump has received significant support from high-profile members of the tech industry, having been given $1,000,000 by Mark Zuckerberg in recent months and obviously earned keen support from Elon Musk throughout and in the time following his election campaign.
He has also remained a popular figure with a number of key social media stars too, perhaps most notably individuals like Jake Paul and podcast host Joe Rogan, who Trump was a guest of prior to the election.

Elon Musk has become one of Trump’s closest allies and is a lock for the inauguration (Scott Olson/Getty Images)
This has led to a packed guest list for his 2025 inauguration, so here are all of the biggest names set to attend.
Donald Trump 2025 inauguration guests
Not every guest has been confirmed so far, but here is a list of the high profile guests that will be in attendance, as reported by TMZ and CBS News:
- Elon Musk
- Mark Zuckerberg
- Tim Cook
- Jake Paul
- Logan Paul
- Jeff Bezos
- Shou Chew
- Sundar Pichai
- Dana White
- Theo Von
- Amber Rose
- Caitlyn Jenner
- Megyn Kelly
- Bryce Hall
- The Nelk Boys
- Javier Milei
- Giorgia Meloni
- Han Zheng
- Carrie Underwood
- Christopher Macchio
- Lee Greenwood
- Village People
Many of the most prominent attendees are those who have rubbed shoulders with Trump in his election campaign, including Jake Paul who invited the president-elect to his boxing fights.
Additionally, many of the biggest names in technology are also scheduled to attend, which is likely a means of staying on top of any regulation changes involving the industry. One key name perhaps is Shou Chew, who has directly benefitted from Trump’s leadership in the past few days after TikTok’s ban appears to have been lifted by the incoming president.
There are also a few world leaders set to arrive in Washington D.C., including Argentina’s President Javier Milei, and China‘s vice president Han Zheng.
Finally, musical guests include the Village People, Lee Greenwood, and Christopher Macchio, and country music star Carrie Underwood is set to sing ‘America the Beautiful’.
Who is not attending Trump’s inauguration?
While the guest list is definitely well populated, there are a few big – and surprising – omissions who won’t be in attendance:
- Michelle Obama
- Nancy Pelosi
- Dr. Phil
- Roseanne Barr
- Savannah Chrisley
- Drea de Matteo

Some consider Joe Rogan to be a doubt despite his close ties to Trump (Jeff Bottari/Zuffa LLC)
It remains currently up in the air as to whether Joe Rogan will be attending the event, as while he did play a key role in Trump’s victory with his podcast, he is not currently on the guest list, as reported by the Economic Times.
This could likely be due to the fact that he’s involved instead in the ‘pre-inauguration festivities’ and thus is attending the main event by default.

It looks like Apple is the latest tech giant to bend to knee to Donald Trump, as CEO Tim Cook has reportedly donated $1 million to his upcoming inauguration.
Cook and Trump are said to have cultivated a symbiotic working relationship over the years, and back during his first presidency, the Apple CEO would phone the President and talk through things directly.
There have been intimate dinners, and in December 2024, Cook was hosted at the Mar-a-Lago resort as other tech bosses were apparently scrambling to get in Trump’s good books.
Jump forward to Trump’s upcoming term, and Cook has reportedly donated $1 million to his inauguration.
Although Cook is said to have personally donated the money himself instead of giving through Apple, it’s thought these massive companies are trying to get the President-elect on their side.

The Apple CEO has apparently made a $1 million personal donation to Trump’s inauguration (MANDEL NGAN / Contributor / Getty)
The news comes courtesy of Axios, which says the donation “reflects a long, collaborative relationship between Trump and Cook.”
Cook’s pledge comes off the back of $1 million donations from the likes of Toyota and Ford, $2 million from Uber, and others from Bank of America, Coinbase, AT&T, and more.
As noted by Newsweek, some of the biggest tech companies around have been donating to the Trump inauguration. Amazon, Meta, and OpenAI have all apparently donated $1 million, which looks to put his donations far ahead of those made to Joe Biden’s inauguration in 2021.
A Federal Election Commission (FEC) filing shows that Apple donated just $43,200 to Biden’s inauguration, while Amazon gave $276,000, and Meta and OpenAI didn’t donate anything.
At the time of writing, there’s no sign of monetary backing for Trump from Google or Microsoft. Google gave $337,500 to Biden, while Microsoft offered $500,000.
Trump has clashed with many of these tech Goliaths, with his Facebook account famously being removed in the aftermath of 2021’s January 6 Capitol riots.
He’s also locked horns with Jeff Bezos over several issues, with the Amazon CEO criticized for the decision to ensure The Washington Post (which he owns) didn’t show allegiance to either Trump or Kamala Harris.

Cook and Trump look to have a good working relationship (Bloomberg / Contributor / Getty)
Still, Bezos referred to Trump’s win as an “extraordinary political comeback and decisive victory.”
When it comes to these latest donations, Meta’s is seemingly from the company itself, whereas both Cook and OpenAI’s Sam Altman are thought to be making personal donations.
Trump is seemingly aware of his new popularity, telling a December press conference: “The first term, everybody was fighting me. In this term, everybody wants to be my friend.”
Cook came under fire for congratulating Trump on his win back in November 2024, but remembering that Ivanka Trump has coined the nickname ‘Tim Apple’ and Trump has previously shared his admiration of the Apple CEO, it’s no real surprise.
Discussing Apple under the leadership of Cook, Trump once said: “If Tim Cook didn’t run Apple, if Steve Jobs did, it wouldn’t be nearly as successful as it is now.”
Of course, all of these donations pale in comparison to the rumored $277 million Elon Musk has spent to help get Trump back into the White House.
Then again, with Musk’s wealth booming to make him the first person to be worth over $400 billion, cozying up to Trump looks like it’s set to pay off.

They say that if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em.
At least that seems to be what Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg is doing, with his latest changes to Facebook and Instagram being accused of ‘copying’ X.
Alongside appointing UFC CEO and Trump ally Dana White to Meta’s board of directors, Zuckerberg announced an overhaul of its free speech rules. Zuckerberg claimed that the third-party fact-checkers that were given powers in 2016 aren’t working anymore, with concerns that people are being ‘wrongly’ placed in Facebook jail.
Instead, the shackles are being removed amid a bit to ‘restore free expression’ to Facebook via a new community note system.
While there are worries that slurs and hate speech will soon be flooding our feed, others have called it a win for Facebook.

Mark Zuckerberg is making sweeping changes to how free speech works on Meta platforms (Bloomberg / Contributor / Getty)
One person who’s clearly taking note is Elon Musk. The X overlord has similarly been criticized for changes he’s made to the platform since he bought Twitter in October 2022 and rebranded it in his own image.
Musk and Zuckerberg have publicly sparred for years, with the pair challenging each other to a cage fight in 2023 and Musk more recently saying, “Any place, any time, any rules.”
It seems they can at least agree on one thing, with Musk giving a three-word response to Meta’s latest update.
Responding to the news of the X-inspired community note system and sharing a title that says “Facebook dumps fact-checkers in attempt to ‘restore’ free speech,” Musk simply wrote: “This is cool.”
This short and sweet response suggests that the rivalry between him and Zuckerberg has been drummed up for attention, and with Musk being firmly by the side of President-elect Donald Trump, some of the biggest tech companies around look like they’re trying to curry favor.
Apple’s Tim Cook has personally donated $1 million to Trump’s inauguration, while Meta has also stumped up $1 million after Zuckerberg reportedly spent some time at the returning POTUS’ Mar-a-Lago residence.
It’s all change at Meta HQ, as former UK deputy prime minister Nick Clegg is out as Facebook’s Head of Global Affairs and is being replaced by former Republican Party operator Joel Kaplan to lead its public policy operations.
Although there are grumbles that Facebook is becoming more right-wing, Zuckerberg argues it’s in response to previous political leanings. Discussing the changes, the tech mogul said: “Fact-checkers have just been too politically biased and have destroyed more trust than they have created.”
Facebook will now ‘get rid of a bunch of restrictions’ on issues ranging from gender to immigration, with Zuckerberg concluding: “What started as a movement to be more inclusive has increasingly been used to shut down opinions.”
With Trump once threatening to send the Meta CEO to jail for life and his book saying that he’ll be ‘watching’ Zuckerberg closely, there are plenty of theories about why these changes are being made and why it’s happening so close to Trump’s inauguration. Either way, the new-look Meta is set to be a divisive one.

The two biggest names head to head in the space race are Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos. But according to the Amazon founder, he’s not losing any sleep over Musk’s progress.
According to Reuters, Bezos shared his optimism about the US government’s space agenda and made it clear he’s confident in Blue Origin’s mission.
Bezos’ company is currently prepping its New Glenn rocket, a towering 30-story spacecraft that’s tasked with eventually launching the company’s moon lander for NASA.
It was due last Monday after several delays, but was postponed for at least another day due to a last-minute issue with the vehicle.
“Elon has been very clear that he’s doing this for the public interest and not for his personal gain. And I take him at face value,” the Blue Origin founder told Reuters on Sunday.

PATRICK T. FALLON / Contributor / Getty
Meanwhile, the Tesla CEO has invested over a quarter billion dollars in supporting Trump whilst keeping up to date on space matters.
Last month, Musk said the US should skip the moon and head straight for Mars which aligns perfectly with his ambitious plans to colonise Mars.
During his second term as president, Trump is expected to overhaul NASA’s moon program and prioritise missions to Mars.
“My own opinion is that we should do both – we need to go to the moon and we should go to Mars,” Bezos said when asked if he was concerned about changes to NASA’s moon program.
“What we shouldn’t do is start and stop things. We should continue with the lunar program for sure.”
Amazon contributed $1 million to Trump’s inauguration fund and plans to stream the event on Prime Video. Apparently, Bezos has previously met with Trump but told Reuters: “We really haven’t discussed space.”

Brandon Bell / Staff / Getty
NASA’s multibillion-dollar Artemis moon program was initiated during Trump’s first term. The project aims to return humans to the lunar surface later this decade and gained the support of President Joe Biden when he was in the White House.
Blue Origin also has ties with NASA in that it has a $3 billion contract to land humans on the moon under Artemis.
“All of these programs take longer than any one presidential administration,” Bezos said. “So you do need continuity in these programs if you’re going to see progress be made.”
All the while Trump has shown a strong focus on Mars missions, fixating on Martian plans and almost hinting at diverting NASA’s space exploration priorities.