OpenAI President Defends Trump Donations, Refuses to Comment on ICE

OpenAI cofounder and president Greg Brockman gave millions of dollars to support President Donald Trump in 2025, despite the fact that Trump can’t run for president again. Why? Apparently, Brockman really wants to encourage government support for AI as the technology suffers from bad press. Just don’t ask Brockman about ICE brutalizing U.S. cities.

Wired published a new interview with Brockman on Thursday that notes the OpenAI president sees himself as an apolitical tech founder who just wants to help humanity with the proliferation of AI.

“We are embarking on a journey to develop this technology that’s going to be the most impactful thing humanity has ever created. Getting that right and making that benefit everyone, that’s the most important thing,†Brockman told Wired.

Last year, Brockman and his wife gave $25 million to MAGA Inc, a pro-Trump super PAC, and $25 million to Leading the Future, a supposedly nonpartisan super PAC that promotes AI. Other contributors to Leading the Future include the pro-MAGA billionaire Marc Andreessen and far-right Palantir co-founder Joe Lonsdale.

The 38-year-old OpenAI president told Wired that he’s doing more political spending because public opinion is turning against AI, something that has shown up in recent polling of Americans. According to a Pew poll from September 2025, 53% of Americans say AI will worsen people’s ability to think creatively, while 16% say it will improve creativity. Just 10% of Americans say they’re more excited than concerned about what AI will do to society, while 57% of Americans rate the societal risks of AI as high.

But arguably the most interesting part of Brockman’s interview with Wired came right at the end. It appears his discussion with Wired happened before the killing of two people in Minnesota at the hands of federal agents. Renee Good was killed on January 7, and Alex Pretti was killed on January 24, gunned down by masked goons sent to Minneapolis by President Trump to terrorize immigrant communities.

Wired reached out to Brockman about the killings, but he apparently declined to comment directly, instead saying, “AI is a uniting technology, and can be so much bigger than what divides us today.†That, of course, is PR bullshit. But it’s to be expected in an environment where Big Tech continues to cozy up to an authoritarian regime hellbent on crushing dissent.

It seems like every big-name tech executive is doing what they can to help Trump, even as the president’s popularity plummets. Guys like Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, and Tim Cook are all lining up to kiss the ring, as long as they can extract government contracts or grease the wheels on mergers and acquisitions.

Greg Brockman isn’t doing anything particularly unique by giving Trump and his cronies millions. But it’s important to keep that mental list of who is helping in the rise of fascism in 2026. Because there will be a day after the Trump era. The 79-year-old is in poor health and has lost any semblance of the popular support he had. Just 36% of Americans approve of the job Trump is doing, according to a new poll from the Associated Press on Thursday.

No one can tell you exactly when Trump’s time as president will be up. But nobody should forget what Brockman and the like did during this time. If those who have funded Trump’s reign of terror are allowed to just wake up in a post-Trump world and pretend like it never happened, we’ll have failed as a society.