The influence of Silicon Valley was on display at Donald Trump’s inauguration, with the 47th president of the United States taking the oath of office flanked by some of the most prominent CEOs of the tech world.
Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Alphabet Inc CEO Sundar Pichai, and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos took some of the most exclusive seats at the inauguration on Monday, sitting closer to the president than even some of his cabinet picks.
The ceremony was originally planned as an outdoor event with tech leaders sitting some distance from Trump on a dais, but it was moved indoors to the much smaller Capitol Rotunda due to unusually cold weather in Washington, DC.
The prominence of some of the world’s richest people at the event marked a break from tradition, as the best seats at presidential inaugurations are typically reserved for family members and former US presidents.
As well as outgoing President Joe Biden, past presidents George W Bush, Bill Clinton, and Barack Obama attended the inauguration, although Nancy Pelosi, the former speaker of the House of Representatives, stayed away.
The optics of Silicon Valley’s proximity to the president were not lost on Trump’s critics, who have warned about the growing threat of a tech oligarchy since his re-election in November.
“When I started talking about Oligarchy, many people didn’t understand what I meant. Well, that’s changed,” Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders said in a post on X.
“When the 3 wealthiest men in America sit behind Trump at his inauguration, everyone understands that the billionaire class now controls our government. We must fight back.”
Some critics noted the combined wealth of just three tech titans – Musk, Zuckerberg, and Bezos – has grown to nearly $1 trillion over the past decade, while the federal minimum wage has remained unchanged since 2009.
They also took issue with what they saw as preferential treatment for even the family members of tech leaders.
Lauren Sanchez, the fiancee of Bezos, and Zuckerberg’s wife Priscilla Chan, also attended the inauguration despite the limited number of seats in the Capitol Rotunda.
US media reported that Musk’s mother, Maye Musk, was seated closer to Trump than most lawmakers or his future cabinet members.
“No congressional spouses were allowed in the Rotunda for the ceremony today. Different rules for the oligarchs,” said left-leaning media commentator Ron Filipkowski on X.
The presence of TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew on Monday also raised eyebrows, as did his seat next to Tulsi Gabbard, Trump’s pick to be the next director of national intelligence.
TikTok briefly shut down in the US on Sunday after its Chinese owner failed to sell the platform as mandated by legislation signed last year by Biden.
Whereas much of the tech industry embraced progressive corporate values like diversity under Biden, top Silicon Valley leaders have moved closer to Trump since the election.
Musk, who spent years expressing support for Democrats, donated more than $200m to Trump’s campaign and is set to lead the newly created Department of Government Efficiency in the new administration.
Bezos blocked an endorsement of Vice President Kamala Harris by The Washington Post during the presidential race, the newspaper he owns reported, citing unnamed sources familiar with the matter.
In advance of the inauguration, Musk and Zuckerberg flew to Florida to spend time with Trump at his Mar-a-Lago resort.
Zuckerberg recently also announced he would end Meta’s fact-checking programme, which conservatives had for years accused of censoring voices supportive of Trump.
Meta, Amazon and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman also donated to Trump’s inauguration fund.
In his final speech as president, Biden last week warned of the “tech industrial complex” and its “dangerous” concentration of power in a speech reminiscent of President Dwight D Eisenhower’s famous 1961 farewell address.
Eisenhower’s speech, given at the height of the Cold War, famously coined the term “military-industrial complex” to describe the relationship between the defence industry and the US government.