Allyson Johnson

American Dream?

Mark Zuckerberg, Lauren Sanchez, Jeff Bezos, Sundar Pichai and Elon Musk during the inauguration in the rotunda of the US Capitol. Photographer: Julia Demaree Nikhinson/AP Photo/Bloomberg

Much comment has arisen about the front row seats at Trump’s inauguration being occupied by four of the richest men in the world.  Most of the comment implied that there was some plutocratic takeover of the government in mind, and Trump’s favored seating of these uber-capitalists was a slap in the face to the blue-collar workers who rallied to put him in office.  But there is another, more positive aspect of this lineup.  Viewed through a different lens, these men exemplify the American Dream in one of its major aspects – that through hard work and merit, an immigrant can achieve success.

Mark Zuckerberg’s great-grandparents were emigrants from Austria, Germany, and Poland. By the time Mark was born on May 14, 1984, in White Plains, New York, his family had attained prosperity as medical professionals.

Jeff Bezos was the natural son of a second-generation Danish immigrant, and was adopted when he was four years old by his mother’s second husband, a Cuban immigrant who came to the US as a refugee when he was sixteen. Miguel Bezos worked at Exxon for thirty-two years, and lend $250,000 to his adopted son in 1995 to start Amazon in exchange for 6% equity in the new company.  He and his son are now both billionaires.

Lauren Sanchez, Jeff Bezos’ fiancée, was born to a second-generation Mexican-American family in Albuquerque, New Mexico.  She was an award-winning news anchor and sports commentator when she became engaged to Jeff Bezos in March 2023.

Sundar Pichai, CEO of Alphabet Inc. and its subsidiary Google,  was born in India to a middle-class family.  He became a US citizen after arriving in the United States in 1993 to pursue graduate school at Stanford and later at the Wharton School in Pennsylvania. He worked as an engineer and product manager at Applied Materials before joining Google in 2004.  His annual salary is north of two million with another six million in “other compensation”. 

Elon Musk was born in South Africa.  His father was an successful engineering consultant and property developer, and also owned an interest in an emerald mine. At the age of 18 Elon immigrated to Canada, acquiring its citizenship through his Canadian-born mother, Maye. He moved to the US and become a US citizen in 2002, retaining his Canadian and South African citizenship.

All these front-row seats are occupied by people who are no more than three generations away from immigration.  Not all their immigrant forebears were “your tired, your poor, your huddled masses” but they all in some way “yearned to breathe free.”  Their success is just what many of the blue-collar and middle-class voters who flocked to Trump would dream of.  This success, as much as the wealth it generated, earned them their front-row seats.