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News > World

Trump Inaguration Swamped by Mega Campaign Donors

  • U.S. President Donald J. Trump and first lady Melania Trump dance while attending the Inauguration Freedom Ball in Washington, U.S., January 20, 2017.

    U.S. President Donald J. Trump and first lady Melania Trump dance while attending the Inauguration Freedom Ball in Washington, U.S., January 20, 2017. | Photo: Reuters

Published 20 January 2017
Opinion

Dozens of billionaires filled the audience of Trump's inauguration.

Donald Trump’s inauguration Friday was packed with mega campaign donors despite the new president’s promises to “drain the swamp” of corporate greed.

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According to documents received by The Intercept, at least a dozen of the 183 seats on the inaugural platform were given to Trump’s biggest fundraisers including Sheldon Adelson, Carl Icahn, Steve Wynn, Woody Johnson, and Richard Lefrak.

The five billionaires, who have a combined net worth of over US$60 billion, were snuggled up next to senators, Cabinet seat holders and Trump’s immediate family.

The documents reveal that another 49 seats for the pre-inaugural Friday morning church service were allocated to billionaire real estate investor Thomas Barrack.

At Barack Obama's second inauguration only two campaign donors — Chris Hughes, the Facebook co-founder, and his husband Sean Eldridge — were present, according to a report by the New York Times.

The billionaire-dotted inauguration ceremony comes in stark contrast to Trump's populist rhetoric against corporate elites, raising doubts over whether the new U.S. president truly intends to rule for "all Americans."

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