President Trump on Thursday will host two dozen high-profile tech and business leaders for the first event in the newly renovated White House Rose Garden, including Meta founder Mark Zuckerberg, Apple CEO Tim Cook, Microsoft founder Bill Gates and OpenAI founder Sam Altman, according to an invite list obtained exclusively by The Hill.
The Rose Garden gathering is set to take place after CEOs and tech leaders attend a White House event on AI hosted by first lady Melania Trump.
“The Rose Garden Club at the White House is the hottest place to be in Washington, or perhaps the world. The president looks forward to welcoming top business, political, and tech leaders for this dinner and the many dinners to come on the new, beautiful Rose Garden patio,” White House spokesperson Davis Ingle said in a statement to The Hill.
Other attendees for the event on Thursday night include dozens of prominent founders and CEOs, including Sergey Brin and Sundar Pichai, founder and CEO of Google, respectively; Safra Catz, CEO of Oracle; David Limp, CEO of Blue Origin; Sanjay Mehrotra, CEO of Micron Technology; and Greg Brockman, president of OpenAI.
The group also includes Satya Nadella, CEO of Microsoft; Vivek Ranadive, founder of Tibco and owner of the Sacramento Kings; Shyam Sankar, chief technology officer of Palantir; and Alexandr Wang, founder of Scale.ai and head of super intelligence at Meta.
David Sacks, a venture capitalist who has been tasked as the White House czar on artificial intelligence and cryptocurrency, will also attend. Additionally, Jared Isaacman, CEO of Shift4, is slated to attend after Trump withdrew his nomination to run NASA in June.
Elon Musk, the Tesla CEO and SpaceX founder who served as a special government employee and top Trump adviser for the first few months of the year before feuding with Trump, is not on the invite list.
Many prominent tech leaders have sought to build a stronger relationship with Trump since he won the 2024 election, and their companies have adjusted their policies to do away with diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives to align with the administration. Zuckerberg, Pichai and Altman attended Trump’s inauguration, while Cook has visited the White House to announce investments in U.S. manufacturing.
Other business leaders who are slated to attend include Jason Chang, founder of CSBio; Nathalie Dompé, CEO of Dompé Pharma; Dylan Field, founder of Figma; John Hering, cofounder of Vy Capital; Sunny Madra, president of Groq; Chamath Palihapitiya, founder of Social Capital; Mark Pincus, founder of Zynga; Jamie Siminoff, founder of Ring; and Lisa Su, CEO of advanced Micro Devices.
The Rose Garden renovation, which included paving over the grass and placing tables, with umbrellas, and chairs around the new patio, was completed in early August. The tables and umbrellas resemble the ones at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago property in Florida.
The Rose Garden is a typical location for presidents to host events, bill signings and speeches and Trump’s first event on Thursday will show off the stone patio instead of the lawn.
The White House teased on Aug. 19 that the Rose Garden was ready for an event. White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt brought reporters back to the space, where the president was testing out new speakers for “what will be the best event in the history of the White House,” she said at the time.
Leavitt added that the next party is “hopefully soon.” In the weeks since, Trump has periodically been heard playing music through the speakers.
The president, who spent decades in the real estate business before running for president, has spent the early months of his second term renovating the White House.
In addition to the Rose Garden, Trump has redecorated the Oval Office with additional portraits, busts and gold trim. He has put up artwork around the building featuring himself, including one piece depicting the 2024 assassination attempt that left him bloodied, while moving other presidential portraits.
And the White House announced last month plans for a $200 million ballroom near the East Wing that would be able to accommodate hundreds of guests for state dinners and other large events.
