Tim Cook, Andy Jassy under fire for attending private premiere of Melania documentary

The chief executives of Apple and Amazon were among dozens of famous guests who attended a secret screening of a controversial new documentary about First Lady Melania Trump.

About 70 guests attended the private screening in the East Room of the White House, hosted by Mrs Trump and attended by her family and friends, including President Donald Trump, their son Barron Trump, and right-wing activist Charlie Kirk’s widow Erika Kirk.

Brett Ratner, the director of Melania, was also in attendance at the black-tie event, as was Apple’s Tim Cook, Amazon’s Andy Jassy, and several other tech leaders, including Zoom CEO Eric Yuan and AMD CEO Lisa Su.

Other guests of the unpublicized January 24th screening included Queen Rania of Jordan, New York Stock Exchange CEO Lynn Martin, and former boxing champion Mike Tyson. Notably, no major Trump administration officials were reportedly in attendance.

The official premiere of Melania will take place later this week on January 29th at the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC. The film will be officially released the next day.

Posting on social media platform X, the first lady hailed the documentary as “a historic moment” and said she was “deeply humbled to have been surrounded by an inspiring room of friends, family, and cultural iconoclasts.”

“Each of these individuals each brought their unique vision to the world, making a lasting impression,” she said.

However, critics derided the event, which was held a day after ICE officers shot and killed 37-year-old protester Alex Pretti in Minneapolis. While the screening was planned well in advance, it was criticized as tone-deaf for taking place amidst tensions in Minnesota.

“Today DHS assassinated a VA nurse in the street, Bondi is attempting to extort voter files, and half the country is bracing on the eve of a potentially crippling ice storm with FEMA gutted. So what is the President up to? Having a movie night at the White House. He’s unfit,” Democratic Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said on X.

Much of the backlash, however, was directed at the CEOs in attendance, with political analyst Joni Askola opining that “US tech oligarchs are making a calculated turn toward fascism.”

“They believe deregulation and total market control are worth sacrificing rights and the constitution to protect their power,” Askola said.

Amazon has reportedly paid $40 million for the rights to the project, a huge sum for a documentary, according to Deadline.

While Andy Jassy, the company’s chief executive, came under fire for attending the White House screening, it was Apple’s Tim Cook who suffered the biggest public relations blow as someone who “has a spine hidden somewhere.”

Critics were particularly aghast that Cook chose to pose with Melania director Brett Ratner for a picture during the White House reception. Ratner, who shared the picture in one of his Instagram stories, faced multiple allegations of sexual assault and harassment in 2017, leading to Warner Bros. cutting ties with him.

Melania is Ratner’s first major film since the allegations surfaced nearly a decade ago, which he has denied. The documentary follows the first lady on the first days of 2025 leading to her husband’s second inauguration as president.

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