Amazon’s billionaire founder, Jeff Bezos, is the latest tech mogul to offer a new wave of support for Donald Trump’s incoming presidency, endorsing the former president’s plans to reduce government regulation and signalling a willingness to collaborate.
Speaking at the New York Times’s DealBook Summit on Wednesday, the entrepreneur and Washington Post owner described himself as “very optimistic this time around” about Trump’s economic and tech strategy.
“I am very optimistic that President Trump is serious about this regulatory agenda,” Bezos said. “If I can help him do that, I’m going to help him, because we do have too much regulation in this country.”
The intervention marks a dramatic reversal from their previously antagonistic relationship. During Trump’s first term, the former president repeatedly attacked Bezos, criticising Amazon and the Washington Post for alleged tax avoidance and biased reporting.
Bezos also defended his recent controversial decision to prevent the Washington Post from endorsing the Democratic candidate, Kamala Harris, a move that reportedly cost the newspaper about 10% of its subscriber base. He described the decision as “far from cowardly”, arguing that the paper needed to maintain some form of independence.
This political repositioning also comes as other tech leaders, notably X and Tesla’s Elon Musk, Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg and OpenAI’s Sam Altman, have also signalled support for Trump. Musk has contributed nearly $75m to a pro-Trump political action committee and is now set to co-lead the so-called “Department of Government Efficiency” meant to slash wasteful government spending. Last week, Zuckerberg dined with Trump at his Mar-a-Lago estate and is believed to be angling for a spot influencing the incoming president’s tech policy.
Still, the tech collaboration between the private sector and government is not exactly new. While the Biden administration went after Apple this year over monopolistic practices, it also developed the sweeping 2023 AI executive order that was in part geared towards tech regulation and helped guide the Chips Act through Congress to become law.
Amazon, Meta and OpenAI are also already a part of a consortium of tech companies in a US government-led initiative to address AI safety regulations.
As for business relationships, Bezos’s pivot appears strategically motivated, with his space company, Blue Origin, potentially positioned to compete for federal contracts in a future Trump administration.
The tech mogul also portrayed Trump as having undergone a personal metamorphosis, describing him as “calmer, more confident and more settled”. He even expressed a desire to moderate Trump’s approach to media relations, saying he would attempt to convince the former president that “the press is not the enemy”.
“You know, you’ve probably grown in the last eight years,” Bezos said at the event. “He has too.”
