- Steve Bannon told ABC News that Trump “broke” the tech giants who’ve embraced him.
- “He broke them, and they surrendered,” the ex-Trump White House aide said on Sunday.
- Bannon has expressed skepticism toward Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg.
Ex-Trump White House chief strategist Steve Bannon said Sunday during an ABC News interview that the attendance of high-profile tech moguls at Donald Trump’s inauguration on Monday signals their “official surrender” to the president-elect.
Bannon, while speaking with journalist Jonathan Karl on “This Week,” said he wasn’t surprised by the expected appearances of Tesla CEO Elon Musk, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, and Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg at Trump’s inaugural.
“As soon as Zuckerberg said, ‘I’ve been invited. I’m going,’ the floodgates opened up, and they were all there knocking, trying to be supplicants,” Bannon told Karl. “I think most people in our movement look at this as President Trump broke the oligarchs; he broke them, and they surrendered.”
Bannon then pointed to President Joe Biden’s farewell speech last week, when the departing president warned that “an oligarchy is taking shape in America,” expressing his view that extreme wealth and influence threatened the nation.
“When Biden talks about that… they only became oligarchs when they flipped on him when they surrendered, and they’re going to come to Trump’s thing,” Bannon said.
The former Trump aide then compared the attendance of the tech titans to Japan officially surrendering on the USS Missouri in September 1945, an event which marked the end of World War II.
“He’s like Gen. Douglas MacArthur,” Bannon said of the president-elect. “That is an official surrender, and I think it’s powerful.”
Bezos and Zuckerberg are set to be guests at Trump’s inauguration, and Musk — a political ally of Trump who has become a fixture of the president-elect’s political orbit — will also be in attendance.
Amazon and Meta each donated $1 million to Trump’s inaugural fund. Other companies have also donated money as many business leaders seek to establish or strengthen ties with Trump ahead of his second term.
Bannon, during the ABC interview, however expressed skepticism of their recent warmness toward Trump.
“Zuckerberg’s, you know, road to Damascus came a little late. It was after the Fifth of November,” Bannon told Karl. “It’s very, you know, now wants to be a bro. … That doesn’t hack it with me.”
“That guy will flip on President Trump, and he’ll flip on us in a second when it’s convenient for him,” he added.
Earlier in January, Bannon called Musk a “truly evil guy” after the tech mogul stood behind his support of H-1B visas. Many conservatives have argued against the visas, insistent that the skilled-worker program is detrimental to American workers.
“I will have Elon Musk run out of here by Inauguration Day,” Bannon said at the time.
Business Insider reached out to Amazon and Meta for comment.
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