Apple CEO Tim Cook was criticized online Monday after attending the White House screening of Melania Trump's self-titled documentary "Melania" and posing for a photo with co-producer and director Brett Ratner.
Ratner, who co-produced and directed the film set to release in theaters Friday, has been accused of rape and sexual misconduct. In December the Department of Justice released thousands of files connected to the Jeffrey Epstein investigation, including a photo of Ratner embracing a shirtless Jean-Luc Brunel, a French model scout and owner of the international modeling agency MC2 Model Management, a modeling agency with considerable financial support from Epstein. Brunel died in 2022 of apparent suicide while awaiting trial on sex-trafficking charges, and in a manner not dissimilar to how Epstein died in 2019.
Cook has been accused of bowing down to the Trump administration, including a personal donation of $1 million to Trump's inaugural committee, private dinners with other billionaires and even gifting Trump a 24-karat stand and glass Apple plaque.
Media experts and social media users called out Cook for his relationship with the Trump administration.
"Apple CEO Tim Cook attended the WH screening of MELANIA, endorsed Trump wholeheartedly and proudly posed with sexual predator and the movie's director Brett Ratner, while ICE agents were slaughtering a VA nurse in Minneapolis. Tim reportedly kept asking, 'Is Goebbels here? Can I get a selfie?" Paul Rudnick, novelist and playwright, wrote on X.
"Here's apple CEO tim cook posing with accused sexual predator brett ratner at a screening of his 'melania' doc at the white house. olivia munn, one of ratner's alleged victims, stars in the apple tv+ series 'your friends & neighbors,'" Columbia University professor and journalist Marlow Stern wrote on X.
"Apple has donated millions to the Trump Administration in the past year. Tim Cook's last post was honoring MLK a week ago. Pretty galling to offer a tribute to a long-dead icon's 'commitment to justice' when you are funding injustice today," Tim Miller, host of The Bulwark Podcast and MS NOW analyst, wrote on X.
"@tim_cook you honored MLK and then dishonored yourself, your company, and the country by bowing to Trump, making a vanity project with his wife and hanging out at the White House last night. Of all nights. Shame. I’m deeply disappointed in you. Shame. You’ve tarnished your legacy," Charlie Fink, professor, producer and podcast host, wrote on X.
"Where you stand is where you fall," journalist and podcast host Kara Swisher wrote on Threads.