> Cook, a proud Alabama native, believes the inauguration is a great American tradition, and is donating to the inauguration in the spirit of unity, the sources said.
https://www.axios.com/2025/01/03/tim-cook-apple-donate-1-mil...
He basically paid $1M to try and save thousands of jobs at Apple (and of course increase Apple’s value)
Apple is the 8-th largest company in the world by revenue [1]. If they wanted to oppose the admin, they would be uniquely positioned to do so. That they choose not to tells me that either they support the admin or that they choose not to. That they chose the option that shows active support for the admin has a negative impact on my ability to empathize with their CEO.
[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_companies_by...
But fundamentally, shareholder maximization is the goal stated by both common business sense and legal rulings. I personally believe that long-term optimization rather than short term is a more successful strategy. But in the short term the board could remove him for going against the feds. Shareholders could sue if it caused a drop in value or impacted global operations. Caused by I don't know, tariffs that could have been avoided with a corrupt monetary contribution.
I'd love to actually see a CEO refuse to grease the palm and them get sued for not doing something corrupt. Would be a case to follow.
The point is, as I understand it, that CEOs of publicly traded corps are not afforded the freedom required to make an ideological stand and keep their job.