Microsoft chief executive Satya Nadella, OpenAI’s Sam Altman, Google’s Sundar Pichai and the Fruity Cargo Cult Apple’s Tim Cook all graced Trump’s table. They endorsed Melania’s grand plan to help America’s children learn AI, which sounds more like a PR stunt than a serious policy.

Meta boss Mark Zuckerberg and Microsoft founder Bill Gates got the best seats, flanking the first couple at a dinner where Trump bragged about making it “easy” to build data centres with permits and electricity. Given Trump’s record, what he really meant was that he would lean on officials until they caved in.

The tech elite’s performance was straight out of Trump’s inauguration playbook, when the same billionaires turned up after writing hefty cheques.

Altman went full fanboy, telling Trump: “Thank you for being such a pro-business, pro-innovation president. It’s a very refreshing change. We’re very excited to see what you’re doing to make all of our companies and our entire country so successful.”

Having spent years criticising Trump, Altman now seems desperate to prove his loyalty.

Nadella gushed too, offering all US college students free access to Copilot AI and promising $4 billion (€3.7 billion) in education donations.

“We are so grateful to the president, first lady and the entire administration,” Nadella said leaving little doubt about who he thinks holds the leash.

Pichai joined the chorus by promising $1 billion (€920 million) in AI-powered education, saying, “It’s an honour for me to be here and to support the first lady’s presidential AI challenge.” Apparently, Google thinks currying favour beats fighting looming antitrust cases.

The most entertaining part of the evening was the empty chair. Elon Musk, once Trump’s favourite tech bro and a self-styled government efficiency tsar, was nowhere to be seen. Officially, he sent a representative. Unofficially, his recent fallout with Trump meant he didn’t make the guest list. If Silicon Valley’s finest think loyalty guarantees them a spot at the table, Musk should serve as a cautionary tale.

Apple, Meta, Microsoft and Google all pledged support for Melania’s “AI challenge,” which somehow mixes kids’ coding lessons with promises to scrub dodgy deepfakes from the internet.