Trump Hosts Tech Leaders at the White House Amid Notable Absence of Musk
U.S. President Donald Trump is hosting a tech summit today, Thursday, September 4, gathering around 24 of the world's leading entrepreneurs and industry leaders at an event held in the newly renovated Rose Garden at the White House.
This meeting comes as a culmination of a close yet complex relationship between Trump and the tech sector during his second term, characterized by many executives seeking to solidify their relationships with the president and appearing alongside him at events to announce initiatives that align with his administration's priorities in emerging technologies and reshoring industries to America.
According to a list confirmed by a White House official, the invitation includes heavyweight names in the tech world, such as Mark Zuckerberg, founder of "Meta"; Tim Cook, CEO of "Apple"; Bill Gates, founder of "Microsoft"; and Sam Altman, founder of "OpenAI". The invitation also included other prominent figures such as Greg Brockman, president of "OpenAI"; Sergey Brin, co-founder of "Google"; Shyam Sankar, CTO of "Palantir"; and Alexander Wang, co-founder of "Scale AI".
The meeting is set to take place at a dinner following a separate event on artificial intelligence hosted by First Lady Melania Trump.
The guest list also included the CEOs of "Google" Sundar Pichai, "Microsoft" Satya Nadella, "Oracle" Safra Catz, and "Micron Technology" David Limp. David Sachs, an investor and head of the cryptocurrency and AI portfolio at the White House, and Jared Isaacman, founder of "Shift4", also attended, despite Trump having withdrawn his nomination in June for the head of NASA.
Notably, the absence of Elon Musk, CEO of "Tesla" and founder of "SpaceX", drew attention, especially after he previously held a position as a special government employee during the early months of the current administration before entering into a public dispute with Trump.
