MAGAfied billionaire Larry Ellison secretly channeled around $45 million into a tax-exempt group propping up Donald Trump’s 2024 election bid, according to an explosive new report.
Ellison, who at 81 is just a year older than the president, has cultivated a low-key bond with Trump that The Wall Street Journal says has benefited both his software giant Oracle and his son David Ellison’s media empire.
The donation, which represents one of the cycle’s largest single checks, flowed through a vehicle shielded from disclosure laws—leaving it hidden until now.
Ellison’s friendship with Trump, however costly, has apparently paid off. The morning after Trump’s second swearing-in, Oracle landed the central role in a $500 billion drive to erect AI data centers around the country.
The White House waved away any hint of favoritism, with spokesperson Kush Desai telling the Journal that Trump is “committed to working with every American business and business leader.”
Ellison’s standing was clear from the start. He arrived for the unveiling of the data-center push without ID but was waved through after Trump personally stepped in, telling the guards, “Everyone knows who Larry is.”
Oracle later joined investors who took over TikTok’s U.S. business through a government-brokered transaction. Ellison’s checkbook has remained open since the vote, with Oracle now among the listed backers of Freedom250, a Trump-friendly group organizing bashes to mark the nation’s 250th anniversary.
His son, David Ellison, 43, has parlayed the same access to the summit of American media. The Trump administration approved a controversial merger between the younger Ellison’s Skydance and media giant Paramount last year.
This month, the Justice Department waved through what is now Paramount Skydance’s $81 billion grab of Warner Bros. Discovery. The tie-up promises to drop CNN, one of Trump’s most reviled networks, squarely in the family’s stable.
Trump has publicly cheered the younger Ellison’s rise, predicting he would outshine his father. Privately, the elder Ellison assured the president that a Paramount win could let him reshape CNN, the Journal reports.
Critics say David Ellison has already proven his mettle on that front at CBS, which has undergone a MAGA-flavored makeover following the merger at parent company Paramount.
The younger Ellison handed Bari Weiss, co-founder of the conservative-leaning Free Press, the top job at CBS News last year.
Her tenure has been marked by disruption, with the network pushing out 60 Minutes executive producer Tanya Simon and correspondents Sharyn Alfonsi and Cecilia Vega, then handing the show to former tech columnist Nick Bilton, a broadcast novice.
Veteran correspondent Scott Pelley, a 37-year fixture, blew up at a June staff meeting, accusing Weiss of moving to destroy the storied program. CBS fired him a day later, with Bilton citing his “antipathy to the future of the show.”
CBS has defended the overhaul as an overdue revival of a flagging division, with Weiss telling staff the company could not “find a way back” with Pelley.
Pelley, in a parting statement, said the new management had pressed him to “inject falsehoods and bias” into a sensitive story. He told the New York Times that Weiss wanted protesters in a Minnesota immigration story to seem more aggressive.
The former 60 Minutes mainstay has cast the shake-up as a bid to please Trump, accusing Ellison of junking the program’s legacy “to curry a moment of favor with the Trump administration.”
Federal filings also show Trump’s brokerage accounts bought and sold stock at Ellison’s firm Oracle this year, each transaction topping $1 million. The Trump Organization told the newspaper that the president has no hand in choosing his investments.
The Daily Beast contacted the White House and Ellison’s representatives for comment on this story.
“President Trump is committed to working with every American business and business leader to cement America’s innovative dominance, reshore critical manufacturing, and accelerate economic growth for everyday American workers,” White House spokesman Kush Desai said.
“Industry leaders in sectors ranging from autos to pharmaceuticals to technology have committed to investing trillions in the United States because they know they have a friend and ally in the White House.”
