{"id":69795,"date":"2025-10-12T12:14:10","date_gmt":"2025-10-12T12:14:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/69795\/"},"modified":"2025-10-12T12:14:10","modified_gmt":"2025-10-12T12:14:10","slug":"from-ai-to-tiktok-to-tv-this-pro-israel-billionaire-is-expanding-power-in-us","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/69795\/","title":{"rendered":"From AI to TikTok to TV, This Pro-Israel Billionaire Is Expanding Power in US"},"content":{"rendered":"

Truthout is a vital news source and a living history of political struggle. If you think our work is valuable, support us with a donation<\/a> of any size.<\/p>\n

Larry Ellison\u2019s name isn\u2019t always mentioned alongside more public-facing megabillionaires like Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, or Mark Zuckerberg. But as he vaults to the top of the U.S. power elite after a string of high-profile corporate deals, that\u2019s about to change.<\/p>\n

Ellison, the founder of the tech giant Oracle, is quickly emerging as the new face of oligarchic power in the U.S. Oracle has become an AI powerhouse at the same time Ellison and his son David have acquired Paramount and its vast media empire. With Donald Trump\u2019s recent executive order<\/a>, Ellison and Oracle will also now oversee TikTok\u2019s algorithms, shaping a platform that reaches 150 million U.S. users.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s more alarming than Ellison\u2019s sheer wealth \u2014 in September, he briefly sur<\/a>passed<\/a> Musk as the world\u2019s richest person \u2014 is that he\u2019s building his concentrated power and control in collaboration with the Trumpian project of attacking so-called \u201cwokeness,\u201d all while supercharging the corporate expansion of artificial intelligence and tech surveillance.<\/p>\n

Moreover, Ellison is a vocal supporter of the Israeli military and a close confidant of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. As Israel looks to repair its image after two years of overseeing a genocide in Gaza, it\u2019ll have a powerful booster in Ellison and his new media kingdom.<\/p>\n

The Making of a Megabillionaire<\/p>\n

Larry Ellison founded Oracle in 1977 and was its CEO for nearly four decades. The firm ascended by providing database software for business and government agencies. Oracle\u2019s first customer<\/a> was the CIA, and the company is named after a CIA project. <\/p>\n

Related Story<\/p>\n


\n \"Elon
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\n The circle of billionaires in Trump\u2019s cabinet embodies the reign of American oligarchy.\n <\/p>\n

Over time, Oracle has swelled into a business empire focused on cloud services and, increasingly, artificial intelligence.<\/p>\n

Today, Ellison is worth more than $350 billion<\/a>. He owns more than 40 percent<\/a> of Oracle\u2019s stock and still serves<\/a> as the corporation\u2019s executive chairman and chief technology officer. Ellison was also on Tesla\u2019s board of directors from 2018 to 2022 and holds a 1.4<\/a> percent<\/a> stake<\/a> in the company that\u2019s worth billions. <\/p>\n

Ellison lives an extravagant lifestyle. He owns properties across the world worth nearly $2 billion<\/a>, including a dozen mansions and estates from California to Rhode Island, Florida to New Jersey, and London to Japan. <\/p>\n

In 2012, he bought nearly all of L\u0101na\u02bbi, Hawaii\u2019s sixth-biggest island, reshaping it<\/a> as a paradise for the super-rich while immiserating longtime inhabitants. <\/p>\n

Ellison also enjoys luxury private jets<\/a> and a $160 million<\/a> mega-yacht<\/a> with a gym, spa, movie theater, and basketball court. A trailing boat reportedly<\/a> collects balls that bounce overboard. His collection of Japanese art and artifacts is worth<\/a> around $86 million. <\/p>\n

Trump-Tied AI Deals<\/p>\n

But far more than wealth and luxury, Ellison has power. Notably, he\u2019s forged a close relationship with Donald Trump, with one Trump adviser calling him<\/a> a \u201cshadow president of the United States.\u201d <\/p>\n

While Ellison hasn\u2019t directly donated to Trump, he personally hosted<\/a> a major<\/a> 2020 Trump fundraiser. Ellison also joined<\/a> a November 2020 call \u201cwhere Trump staffers and supporters discussed strategies for challenging their candidate\u2019s loss at the ballot box,\u201d according to The Washington Post<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Safra Catz, who served as Oracle\u2019s CEO<\/a> from 2014 to 2025 and is now its billionaire<\/a> executive vice chair, donated over $130,000<\/a> toward Trump\u2019s 2020 presidential run (though to be sure, Oracle\u2019s PAC showers money<\/a> on both parties).<\/p>\n

Ellison\u2019s support for Trump is now paying off, helping to \u201csecure Oracle\u2019s place at the table,\u201d says the Financial Times<\/a>, as Trump advances massive business deals tied to his political agenda. <\/p>\n

This is seen starkly in Oracle\u2019s stunning ascendency in the rush<\/a> around generative AI<\/a>. Oracle has rapidly secured<\/a> nearly a half-trillion dollars in contracts to supply computing power through data centers to AI companies, joining the ranks of powerhouses like Microsoft and Amazon.<\/p>\n

A huge swath of Oracle\u2019s AI business comes from a $300 billion deal<\/a> with OpenAI, the maker of ChatGPT. Oracle\u2019s partnership with OpenAI was supercharged by Trump\u2019s announcement in January of the Stargate AI joint venture, which The New York Times called an \u201cearly trophy\u201d for Trump. <\/p>\n

Indeed, Stargate is just one expression of the mutually beneficial alliance that Ellison has forged with Trump. Oracle\u2019s expanding partnership with OpenAI reflects a new primacy for Ellison within the AI boom that is increasingly driving<\/a> the entire U.S. economy.<\/p>\n

Media Mogul<\/p>\n

This should raise alarm bells, especially since Ellison has openly celebrated AI\u2019s ability to surveil people, pronouncing<\/a> in 2024 that \u201ccitizens will be on their best behavior because we are constantly recording and reporting everything that\u2019s going on.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ellison\u2019s alliance with Trump is also transforming him into an unrivaled media mogul. <\/p>\n

His family\u2019s media company, Skydance, which is financially backed<\/a> by Larry Ellison and run by his son David, struck a deal<\/a> in 2024 to acquire Paramount, owner of CBS and a top-five<\/a> movie studio along with a slew of popular cable channels. The $8 billion merger closed<\/a> in August 2025, creating Paramount Skydance, overseen by David Ellison, who was photographed<\/a> with Trump at an Ultimate Fighting Championship event in April. (Hours after the Ultimate Fighting Championship match, Trump attacked CBS on social media).<\/p>\n

The Ellisons\u2019 Paramount deal was greased by accommodating Trump\u2019s attack against the media. In July, Paramount agreed<\/a> to settle a lawsuit from Trump, which claimed that CBS interfered in the 2024 election. Just weeks later, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) approved the Ellisons\u2019 acquisition.<\/p>\n

The FCC\u2019s approval was accompanied by a polemical statement<\/a> from FCC Chairman Brendan Carr that \u201cAmericans no longer trust the legacy national news media to report fully, accurately, and fairly,\u201d and that the new owners will \u201cadopt measures that can root out the bias\u201d and not establish \u201cinvidious forms of DEI discrimination.\u201d<\/p>\n

Soon after, the Ellisons signaled their rightward swing with the $150-million hiring<\/a> of Bari Weiss, founder of the anti-\u201cwoke\u201d Free Press, as CBS News\u2019s editor-in-chief, and their appointment<\/a> of Kenneth Weinstein, former head of the conservative Hudson Institute think tank, as CBS\u2019s new ombudsman, a position they agreed to fill as part of the merger\u2019s approval.<\/p>\n

Like the robber barons of the late 19th-century U.S., Ellison is consolidating his control over a vast corporate empire that dominates major sectors, from cloud storage and AI data centers, to iconic movie studios, mass news channels, and social media.<\/p>\n

The Ellisons\u2019 quest for media dominance doesn\u2019t end with Paramount. They\u2019re reportedly eying Warner Brothers<\/a>, the iconic movie studio and owner of CNN and HBO. Such an acquisition, which would need the Trump administration\u2019s approval, would create a media empire transcending even Rupert Murdoch\u2019s conglomerate. <\/p>\n

And then came the TikTok deal.<\/p>\n

The New King of TikTok<\/p>\n

Donald Trump attacked TikTok for years as part of his wider campaign against China, but the effort to ban the app gathered momentum in 2024. <\/p>\n

As Israel carried out its genocide in Gaza, many politicians blamed<\/a> the popular app, which has 150 million<\/a> U.S. users who skew young, for spreading anti-Israel views because its algorithms showed the vast scale of Gaza\u2019s destruction and the killing of Palestinians.<\/p>\n

Congress passed a bill<\/a> to ban TikTok unless it was sold off to U.S. owners, and the sale has sat in limbo until now.<\/p>\n

Trump\u2019s new TikTok deal<\/a> is expected to place a U.S. version of the app within the hands of a coterie of billionaires that include<\/a> Trump-aligned magnates like Michael Dell, Jeff Yass, Rupert Murdoch, and Marc Andreessen.<\/p>\n

But Larry Ellison is the true winner of Trump\u2019s TikTok decree. In addition to a \u201crumored<\/a>\u201d 15 percent stake in the app, Oracle will serve as the \u201csecurity provider<\/a>\u201d overseeing<\/a> TikTok\u2019s algorithms in the U.S.Trump joked<\/a> that he\u2019d like to make TikTok\u2019s algorithm \u201c100% MAGA\u201d when he signed the new executive order in September.<\/p>\n

For Ellison, all his new acquisitions present the opportunity to forge a truly novel corporate mega-empire that will dominate the U.S. media and attention economy, injecting his agenda like a thread across an AI-powered chain of news outlets, streaming sites, film studios, and social media outlets.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe Love the Country of Israel\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThese are very smart people, and none of this is accidental,\u201d noted<\/a> one business professor.<\/p>\n

All of this is very good for Benjamin Netanyahu and Israel\u2019s vast influence operation.<\/p>\n

Ellison is a staunch backer of Israel. He is one of the top donors to the Friends of the Israel Defense Forces (FIDF), a U.S. nonprofit that effectively subsidizes<\/a> the Israeli military. Ellison has given the FIDF at least<\/a> $26.6 million<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel a deep emotional connection to the State of Israel and the Israeli people,\u201d Ellison<\/a> said<\/a> at the 2014 FIDF gala. \u201cWe love the country of Israel and we\u2019ll do everything we can to support the country of Israel,\u201d he added, with his \u201cwe\u201d seeming to refer to Oracle.<\/p>\n

Ellison is also extremely close to Netanyahu, who has been accused<\/a> of war crimes and crimes against humanity by the International Criminal Court over Israel\u2019s genocide in Gaza.<\/p>\n

Netanyahu has vacationed<\/a> at Ellison\u2019s island in Hawaii, and Ellison maneuvered<\/a> to push Israeli billionaire Arnon Milchan to allow Milchan\u2019s star attorney to represent Netanyahu in one of his corruption cases. Milchan was hesitant but \u201che relented after pressure from Ellison,\u201d reports<\/a> the Times of Israel. Ellison is also mentioned in two<\/a> of Netanyahu\u2019s corruption cases.<\/p>\n

Drop Site News<\/a> reports that Ellison once vetted Secretary of State Marco Rubio for \u201cfealty to Israel\u201d with Ron Prosor, then-Israeli ambassador to the United Nations. Hacked emails show that Prosor updated Ellison in 2015 and 2016 on Israel\u2019s actions at the United Nations and referred to a meeting where Ellison expressed \u201ca wish to get more involved in Israel.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ellison is also a backer<\/a> of former U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair and has given or pledged at least $348 million<\/a> to Blair\u2019s Institute for Global Change. Blair could be part of<\/a> Trump\u2019s \u201cBoard of Peace\u201d in Gaza if the current ceasefire deal holds. <\/p>\n

Leaked emails published<\/a> in Responsible Statecraft also reveal that in 2015, Oracle\u2019s then-CEO Safra Catz urged former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak to be a consulting producer for a TV show about the Israeli military to shape U.S. public opinion in Israel\u2019s favor and combat the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions movement. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe believe that we have to embed the love and respect for Israel in the American culture,\u201d the Israeli-born Catz told<\/a> Barak. As a top Oracle executive, Catz likely \u201coversaw much of the negotiations involving the TikTok purchase,\u201d notes<\/a> Responsible Statecraft.<\/p>\n

Netanyahu recently called<\/a> TikTok \u201cthe most important purchase going on right now,\u201d adding that \u201cweapons change over time,\u201d and the most important ones today \u201care on social media.\u201d <\/p>\n

Now Oracle, led by Netanyahu\u2019s friend and staunch ally Larry Ellison, is overseeing<\/a> TikTok\u2019s U.S. algorithms.<\/p>\n

There are already clear signs<\/a> of Ellison\u2019s intent to take his new media empire in a pro-Israel direction, including his hiring of Weiss<\/a> as CBS News\u2019s editor-in-chief. The billionaire-courting<\/a> Weiss is a staunch Zionist<\/a> whose Free Press has stoked \u201cgenocide denial\u201d with an \u201cinvestigation<\/a>\u201d into \u201cpreexisting health conditions\u201d of starving Palestinian children, notes<\/a> The Intercept.<\/p>\n

Modern-Day Robber Baron<\/p>\n

Like the robber barons<\/a> of the late 19th-century U.S., Ellison is consolidating his control over a vast corporate empire that dominates major sectors, from cloud storage and AI data centers, to iconic movie studios, mass news channels, and social media.<\/p>\n

And clearly, Ellison is bringing his politics with him: Trump-aligned, anti-\u201cwoke,\u201d and staunchly pro-Israel.<\/p>\n

\u201cEverything is consolidating,\u201d media historian Michael Socolow told<\/a> The New York Times. \u201cWhat makes these deals different is that they are across multiple platforms.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cTo have the opportunity to establish an editorial line across TikTok, CBS News and CNN \u2014 that\u2019s a new world,\u201d Socolow added.<\/p>\n

Media that fights fascism<\/p>\n

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This article is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)<\/a>, and you are free to share and republish under the terms of the license.<\/p>\n