Google donates $1 million to Trump's inauguration, more than triple what it gave in 2017
Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu via Getty Images
- Google is joining tech companies like Amazon and Meta in donating to Donald Trump's inauguration.
- The search giant said it is giving $1 million, more than triple what it gave Trump in 2017.
- In September, Trump threatened to prosecute Google if he was elected president.
Google said it is donating $1 million to President-elect Donald Trump's coming inauguration.
"Google is pleased to support the 2025 inauguration, with a livestream on YouTube and a direct link on our homepage. We're also donating to the inaugural committee," the company's global head of government affairs and public policy, Karan Bhatia, told CNBC.
Google's contribution, which will help fund the celebratory events after Trump takes office, is more than triple what it gave in 2017. The search giant donated $285,000 to Trump's first inauguration, per Federal Election Commission filings.
Back in September, Trump said in a Truth Social post that he would prosecute Google "at the maximum levels" if he won the election.
In his post, Trump accused Google of "illegally" using its system to display only "bad stories" about him while surfacing positive reports about his rival, Vice President Kamala Harris.
Google and Trump's transition team did not immediately respond to requests for comment from Business Insider.
Trump's second inauguration, on January 20, has seen donations pour in from multiple companies and business leaders.
The president-elect has received contributions from tech companies like Amazon, Meta, Microsoft, and Uber. Like Google, all four companies have donated $1 million each.
That's on top of the personal donations made by tech executives like OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi. Both Altman and Khosrowshahi donated $1 million each as well.
"One of the big differences between the first term, in the first term, everybody was fighting me. In this term, everybody wants to be my friend," Trump said at a press conference in December.
"I don't know, my personality changed or something," he added.
Since winning the election in November, Trump has raised more than $200 million in donations, of which at least $150 million will go toward the inauguration, The New York Times reported on Saturday.
Trump raised $106.8 million for his first inauguration in 2017, per the FEC.