Some of the GOP lawmakers featured prominently at Trump's inauguration last week, including Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, and Google CEO Sundar Pichai. There are some GOP lawmakers who are arguing about President Trump's “kitchen cabinet.”
But worse than any of these bold names was TikTok CEO Xiu Zhu's place of honor on the stage at Trump's inauguration. Trump immediately gave TikTok a major reprieve after being sworn in, signing an executive order to suspend the TikTok ban supported by many Republicans in Congress for 75 days.
“It's a concern. It's a concern. I don't love it,” he said, supporting the TikTok ban and worrying about the censorship of conservative opinions by prominent California-based social media companies. said one Republican senator.
Republican senators are rushing to confirm Trump's official Cabinet nominees, such as Pam Bondi, to serve as Treasury secretary to serve as attorney general, but some of them are Trump's unofficial advisers. has expressed skepticism about the tech titan, who has been welcomed into its inner circle. .
Many GOP lawmakers see the modern-day master of the universe, who was the guest of honor at Trump's inauguration, as the epitome of the coastal “elites” that Trump repeatedly campaigned on throughout the 2024 election.
Sen. Kevin Cramer (RN.D.) hopes Trump will have some firefighters and other working-class heroes to balance out the billionaires on stage at his inauguration. I said there is.
“I hope we have a firefighter and a soup kitchen operator,” he said.
Cramer noted that California's powerful tech leaders have been allied with Democrats for longer than Republicans, and he claimed they are now trying to buy their way into Trump's good graces. .
“These people were not our friends until recently because they were trying to buy their way,” he said of Trump-friendly billionaires who have been at odds with the MAGA movement in the past. .
Cramer thought Republicans would embrace an 11th-hour shift.
“I'm getting them to be supporters of free speech for all,” he said. “It was a little strange.”
Trump and Bezos feuded bitterly during Trump's first term, with much of the animosity stemming from The Washington Post's coverage of his administration.
Trump spoke out against what he called “The Washington Post's fake news” and accused Amazon of unfairly avoiding state and local taxes while freeloading on the U.S. Postal Service.
He accused Bezos of using the Washington Post as a “big tax haven” for his profits at Amazon.
Trump also crossed swords with Zuckerberg's Facebook, suspending the president from the platform for two years starting January 6, 2021, following the attack on the U.S. Capitol by a mob of Trump supporters.
Zuckerberg ran afoul of conservative critics as Facebook censored controversial opinions related to the Covid-19 pandemic.
The Facebook co-founder later told House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) that White House officials had sent him several Covid-19 posts, including humorous and satirical posts. He said in the letter that he had pressured him to take down 19-related content.
Google, another Silicon Valley giant, has been accused of censorship by conservatives.
Missouri's Republican attorney general announced in October that he had launched an investigation into Google for censoring conservative speech during the 2024 election.
Trump himself accused Google in 2018 of “suppressing conservative voices and that it hides good information and news.”
“They control what we can and cannot see. This is a very serious situation!” Trump declared in an online post at the time.
Amazon, Meta – Facebook's parent company and Google each donated $1 million to Trump's inauguration. But Republicans warn that the nation's tech titans won't be able to erase history so easily.
“If they're trying to buy peace with the Trump administration, I think they're fooling themselves,” said Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas).
“It's hard to know what their calculations are other than they're dealing with the reality that Trump is there. They want to at least maintain the lines of communication,” he added. Ta.
One issue of great importance to tech companies like Amazon, Facebook, and Google is Section 230 of the Communications Daetency Act, which protects online platforms from liability for third-party content on their sites.
Trump pushed hard to repeal Section 230 during his first term, until vetoing the annual National Defense Authorization Act in 2020 because it wasn't included.
Trump at the time was referred to as Section 230, “Serious Threat to National Security and Election Integrity.”
But Republicans who support repealing Section 230 may want to take on liability protection for major technology platforms because Trump respects him and funnels money to his political coffers. I'm thinking about it.
Trump reversed his previous support for the so-called TikTok ban, which he vocally supported during his first term.
He ordered an ordinance by the app's Chinese parent company to divest its ownership from TikTok in 2020, following a unanimous recommendation by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States.
But on Monday, he signed an executive order that suspended the ban passed by Congress last year and was supported by many GOP lawmakers.
The move did not go down well with Trump's Republican allies on Capitol Hill.
Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), a leading proponent of the ban, said that “companies that host, distribute, service, or promote Communist Party-controlled TikTok will be charged hundreds of billions of dollars. He warned that he could face devastating liability.
He issued that statement on January 19, after the Biden White House signaled that it would not enforce the TikTok ban.
Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-Okla.), another staunch Trump ally, said he still supports the law 100%.
“I'll vote again. Absolutely. It's a national security issue. To me, that's not up for debate. The CCP has all its fingers in it,” he said.
