CEO of Apple, Tim Cook,will donate a million dollars from his own pocket to the inauguration committee of the US president-elect Donald Trump this was reported today on the website “Axios” according to sources familiar with the details of the donation.
The donation reflects a long and fruitful relationship between Trump and Cook, which included many meetings during Trump’s first term, and a dinner at Mar-a-Lago last month. According to the sources, Cook, a native of Alabama who is proud of his heritage, sees the inauguration as an important American tradition, and contributes in a spirit of unity. Apple itself is not expected to contribute to the event.
Over the years, Cook has demonstrated a consistent presence in Washington, emphasizing his belief in active participation and dialogue with policymakers on both sides of the political divide. Apple, a significant contributor to the American economy, is the largest taxpayer in the US and in the world.
According to a post-election front-page Wall Street Journal report titled “How Tim Cook Cracked the Code to Work With Trump,” the CEO spent years building a personal relationship with Trump. The newspaper reported that Cook “developed a strategy of meeting with Trump brought a single point of information to focus on a single issue in each meeting,” an approach that helped prevent the meetings from scattering in too many directions.
In Trump’s financial disclosure document released after he left the White House, it was reported that Cook gave the president a $5,999 Mac Pro computer made at a factory in Austin that the two toured in 2019. Cook also met with Trump at Trump Tower and his club in Bedminster, New Jersey. According to the report, Elon Musk Join part of the dinner at Mar-a-Lago.
Other inaugural donors from Silicon Valley include Amazon, Meta, Uber and the CEO of OpenAI Sam Altman. From Wall Street, Goldman Sachs and Bank of America are contributing, while the crypto exchanges Kraken and Coinbase are also joining the move. Car manufacturers Toyota, Ford and General Motors are each donating at least one million dollars.