In a delicate high-stakes maneuver, Apple CEO Tim Cook is carefully avoiding political labels while strongly aligning his company with President Trump’s “America First” economic priorities.
Emphasizing Apple’s massive $600 billion commitment to U.S. operations and manufacturing over the next four years, Cook justified his close engagement with the White House as essential for advancing pro-growth, domestic-focused policies—even amid sharp criticism from the left regarding his attendance at a private screening of the “Melania” documentary about the First Lady.
“You were at the inauguration last year, just feet from the president. You gave him a nice gift at the White House. You were at the screening of ‘Melania,’ the documentary for the First Lady. There’s so many people [who] say you’re really close to the administration, and you’re being criticized for that,” Good Morning America co-host Michael Strahan remarked during an interview centered on Apple’s 50th anniversary.
“Well, what I do is I interact on policy, not politics,” Cook replied. “I’m not a political person on either side. I’m not political. And so I’m kind of straight down the middle, and I focus on policy,” the CEO continued. “And so, I’m very pleased that the president and the administration is accessible to talk about policy.”
Kristen Altus for FOXBusiness:
Apple has openly been collaborating with President Donald Trump to reshore critical supply chains and move away from overseas reliance, aiming to secure a made-in-America future that hedges against global trade volatility. Cook further discussed the leading tech company’s $600 billion commitment to the domestic economy over the next four years.
“If you looked at your iPhone today, the front cover and the back cover, all of that glass will be coming out of Kentucky by the end of this year. The engine, the system on a chip, we’re gonna make over 100 million of those in Arizona this year,” Cook said.
“We’re going to make over 20 billion semiconductors in the U.S. And again, this is not only for the U.S. market-sold iPhones, it’s for worldwide iPhones,” he added. “We’ve invested more in the U.S. Absolutely. We’re a very proud American company and want to do as much here as we possibly can.”
MacDailyNews Notee: Apple CEO Tim Cook discusses the company on Good Morning America on March 17, 2026:
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