US President Donald Trump hosted a private dinner at the White House on Thursday for an exclusive group of top technology executives, with several leaders of Indian origin attending the event.
The Indian-American CEOs on the guest list include Sundar Pichai of Google, Microsoft chief Satya Nadella, Micron Technology head Sanjay Mehrotra, TIBCO Software chairman Vivek Ranadive, and Shyam Sankar from Palantir.
Elon Musk Absent
However, Elon Musk, the Tesla, X, and SpaceX leader who was once among Trump’s closest allies before a falling out did not attend the event.
In a post on X, Musk clarified that he was invited, but unfortunately could not attend the event.
“I was invited, but unfortunately could not attend. A representative of mine will be there,” he said.
Bill gates but not Elon Musk….wtf? https://t.co/3mLD1vKVgv — Natalie F Danelishen (@Chesschick01) September 4, 2025
A White House official later confirmed that Musk was not included on the guest list.
Other Influential Guest
The event also saw the presence of some of the most influential names in global technology, including Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, Apple CEO Tim Cook, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Google co-founder Sergey Brin, OpenAI leaders Sam Altman and Greg Brockman, Oracle CEO Safra Catz, Blue Origin’s David Limp, Scale AI founder Alexandr Wang, and Shift4 Payments chief Jared Isaacman.
Earlier in the day, First Lady Melania Trump hosted a White House event focused on artificial intelligence, which was attended by Altman and Pichai.
Musk-Trump Rift
Elon Musk and Donald Trump’s association began in July last year, when the Tesla CEO publicly supported the Republican in the race for the White House following an attempted attack on him in Pennsylvania. Musk contributed millions to Trump’s campaign and quickly developed a close working relationship with him.
Their connection grew strong enough that Musk was appointed as an unpaid presidential advisor under the “special government employee” category and was named co-chair of the newly formed Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
The relationship, however, suffered a major rift earlier this year over Trump’s ‘Big Beautiful Bill.’ Musk criticised the administration’s spending plan, saying it would widen the federal deficit and undermine the initiatives of DOGE.
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