The America First Standard #2: Have Tech Oligarchs Co-opted MAGA?
Today is the inauguration of President Donald J Trump. Inaugurations are typically joyous occasions full of pageantry. However, this year’s inauguration does not have the same aura that the 2017 inauguration held.
Why the difference? Well, the 2017 inauguration felt like a true “America First” victory, During the 2016 US presidential election, Donald Trump seemingly took in the entire political establishment and Regime-media complex with little outside help. In his 2017 inauguration speech, President Trump gave a rousing
The following excerpt from Trump’s 2017 inaugural address is one of my personal favorite speeches in all of American history:
“… We assembled here today our issuing a new decree to be heard in every city, in every foreign capital, and in every hall of power, from this day forward: a new vision will govern our land, from this day forward, it’s going to be only America first. America first.
Every decision on trade, on taxes, on immigration, on foreign affairs will be made to benefit American workers and American families. We must protect our borders from the ravages of other countries making our products, stealing our companies and destroying our jobs. Protection will lead to great prosperity and strength. I will fight for you with every breath in my body, and I will never, ever let you down. America will start winning again, winning like never before...”
The spirit of 2016 was “America First”. Tens of millions of Americans got behind an ostentatious businessman from New York City in order to finally put the American people ahead of globalist corporations, foreign interests, and political donors.
Unfortunately, the 2025 inauguration does not the same “America First” vibe that the 2017 inauguration possessed. The unfortunate reality is Big Tech Oligarchs have began to co-opt the MAGA movement away from its nationalist, populist roots.
According to Open Secrets, two of President Trump’s some of Trump’s biggest donors in the 2024 election cycle were none other than Tech oligarchs Elon Musk, Ben Horowitz, Marc Andreessen, Joe Lonsdale, David Sacks, Jacob Helberg, and more. These Tech millionaires and billionaires donated millions of dollars to pro-Trump super PAC’s during the 2024 presidential campaign.
In June 2024, former Paypal COO David Sacks hosted a major fundraiser for President Trump at Sack’s home in San Francisco home. This Silicon Valley-area fundraiser reportedly brought in over $12 million to the Trump war chest and was just the start to the millions of dollars that Tech oligarchs would donate to pro-Trump super PACs over the next several months.
Even worse, multiple Big Tech companies and CEOs have donated to Trump’s 2025 Inauguration fund. Tech CEOs Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, Sam Altman, and Tim Cook all have pledged to donate at least one million dollars to President Trump’s inauguration. Even Google and Microsoft joined the party and decided to donate $1 million each to Trump’s inaugural fund.
Big-moneyed interests often influence public policy, and we can likely expect a fairly cordial relationship between the 2nd Trump administration and Silicon Valley based on the donations and rhetoric coming from President Trump himself.
Just last month, President Trump endorsed Elon Musk’s untenable support for the disastrous H-1B visa program in America. As you can probably guess by now, major American tech companies use the H-1B visa program in order to hire cheaper immigrant labor instead of native-born Americans. Trump’s newfound support for H-1B visas came after he strongly criticized the anti-American program during his 2016 presidential campaign.
By all available evidence, it appears that America’s Tech oligarchs have compromised the MAGA movement to some degree, and I have a hard time believing that the 2nd Trump administration is going to enact “America First” policies when the biggest donors to MAGA are now globalist Tech billionaires.
