Corporate America's new first commandment: Honor thy Trump
Add Axios as your preferred source to
see more of our stories on Google.
Illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios. Photo: Erin Schaff/Getty Images
Corporate America has a new top priority: Give Donald Trump what he wants.
Why it matters: The next four years will be dominated not by technocratic rule of law but rather by the whims of America's most mercurial president.
- Getting into his good graces — and staying there — has taken on existential importance for many corporations.
The big picture: Trump is probably the most transactional president in U.S. history, and a seat at his table can be worth billions of dollars. (Even more in the case of first buddy Elon Musk, whose net worth has increased by some $170 billion since Election Day.)
- Trump has an almost unprecedented degree of influence over all three branches of government, which means that he personally has significant power over the fortunes of pretty much every corporation in the country.
How it works: Trump likes to think of himself above all as a dealmaker. The way into his good graces is to present him with a deal where he comes out ahead.
- TikTok's masterclass in sycophancy is an excellent example of what dealmaking in the Trump era looks like in practice.
- By giving Trump a W and Biden an L, the social media platform remains online even with a law in effect — upheld unanimously by the Supreme Court — saying it cannot operate in this country.
Between the lines: America's most powerful billionaires can validate Trump simply by turning up.
- As an outer-borough New York City property developer with a chip on his shoulder about never being fully accepted in the highest echelons of commerce, Trump basks in the way that the world's richest men — Musk, Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg — are now happy to make him the center of their attention.
- Press barons can dial back the criticism of Trump and dial up the praise. Marc Benioff, the owner of Time, not only celebrated Trump at a New York Stock Exchange event, he also printed two different covers of the current issue, both of them highly flattering to the president.
Follow the money: Now that Trump has issued his own cryptocurrency, everyone else can attempt to butter him up the old-fashioned way, just by sending him money.
- "Through his meme coin, Trump has created a way to circumvent national security and anti-corruption laws, allowing interested parties to anonymously transfer money to him and his inner circle," Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) said in a statement, noting that "buyers could include large corporations."
- Trump's stash of 800 million $TRUMP coins will start to be unlocked in April, at which point the Trump Organization will be free to sell them to anybody who would like to buy their way into his good graces.
The bottom line: Trump has a manichean world view: He is prone to dividing the world into friends and enemies.
- It behooves all corporations to make sure they're on the "friends" side of that line.
