Trump's inaugural fund has made a record $170M US in donations. Why corporations are cashing in

Outside of the White House, just days before president-elect Donald Trump's inauguration day, preparations were underway for a ceremony that will be funded by a record-setting number of corporate donations — including from many first-time donors from the worlds of tech, artificial intelligence and crypto.

"I can see it both ways," said Jr. Lopez, a tourist from Dalton, Ga., who was visiting the nation's capital ahead of inauguration day. Lopez said the ceremony — an American tradition that celebrates the incoming president, with politicians from both sides of the aisle in attendance — is meant to be a day for the people.

However, "if you have too much corporate influence in politics, that could cause problems. And it could overlook the interest of the people [in favour of] big corporations," he said.

Trump's second inaugural fund has so far raised $170 million US, breaking the record he set in 2017 and eclipsing the total donations collected by Biden and Obama's presidential inauguration committees, which are appointed by the incoming administration to organize inauguration day festivities.

The donations, while symbolic, show that some corporations are vying for a friendly relationship with the president-elect, hoping that he'll follow through on deregulation promises and claims that he'll fire officials running oversight agencies like the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and the Federal Trade Commission.

Others might be offering the money as a mea culpa to Trump, who has publicly dressed down companies for perceived slights against him, including Meta's Facebook — Trump once referred to the company as an "enemy of the people" for banning him from its platform in the aftermath of the Jan. 6, 2021, riots.

But CEO Mark Zuckerberg has recently praised the president-elect and admitted that the company is making changes, like moving away from fact-checking, to fit into the current political climate. He's attending the inauguration alongside other tech executives like Apple's Tim Cook and OpenAI's Sam Altman.

"The donations to the inaugural fund are basically to gain favour and to gain access," said Bruce Freed, president and co-founder of the Center for Political Accountability, a non-governmental organization that advocates for transparency in corporate political spending. 

"They understand that the relationship with Trump is going to be transactional," added Freed. "Even Trump has made it clear he's going to do as he pleases, but he expects everybody to pony up."

Republican lobbyist Ozzie Palomo, who is co-founder and managing director of Chartwell Strategy Group in Washington, D.C., said there was more uncertainty in 2017 when Trump first came into office. "People were very reticent to socially and publicly align themselves. That stigma is gone," he said.

"By no means is an inauguration weekend the opportunity to settle all of your policy concerns, but it allows you to show face and start to build those relationships with key stakeholders that are going to be in positions of power over the next four years."

CBC News reached out to 20 companies, many of which confirmed that they'd made a donation to Trump's inaugural fund.

Boeing contributed $1 million US to Trump's inaugural fund this year, having donated the same amount to Biden's inaugural fund in 2021 and Trump's first inaugural fund in 2017. A spokesperson for the aviation giant said the company is "pleased to continue Boeing's bipartisan tradition of supporting U.S. Presidential Inaugural Committees."

Google, Microsoft and Meta each donated $1 million to the fund. A spokesperson for Uber said the ride-hailing company donated $1 million to the fund (the same as its contribution to Biden's 2021 ceremony) and that its CEO Dara Khosrowshahi donated an additional $1 million this year.