Last week Amazon announced plans to release a “behind the scenes” documentary about Melania Trump, produced by the future US first lady herself. The tech giant reportedly paid $40m for the exclusive deal just weeks after it donated $1m to her husband Donald Trump’s inauguration committee and committed to livestreaming the ceremony on its Prime service.

Before the presidential election in November, the founder of Amazon Jeff Bezos also canceled plans for The Washington Post, which he owns, to endorse Trump’s Democratic rival. Shortly after the election, he spoke favorably of Trump’s “energy around deregulation” and made a personal trip to dine with the incoming president at his Mar-a-Lago estate.

Bezos’ rush to cozy up to the Trumps has been matched by corporate executives across America, as tech billionaires, financiers and the leaders of some of the US’s most prominent consumer groups rush to adjust. a more conservative zeitgeist after Trump’s election victory. and the Republican sweep of both houses of Congress.

In a mirror image of the 2020 corporate rush to support social justice causes following the killing of George Floyd by a police officer, companies now changing the way they interact with their customers, employees and society in general.

Some of the activities, such as the parade of visiting CEOs Trump in Florida, the donations, and the business efforts of people in his inner circle, seem designed to curry favor with a man famous for attacking companies and executives he doesn’t like.

But the election also facilitated a broader shift back to more conservative social and political principles and an embrace of unfettered capitalism.

Companies are scrapping diversity, equity and inclusion departments, cutting their support for racial diversity charities, and removing climate change groups. They also excavate anything that could be considered “woke” from public statements, corporate documents and advertising.

The election empowered some top executives to start speaking out in favor of conservative policies, from tax cuts to traditional gender roles.

“There are conservative pressures in this political climate, and people are just waiting for a change in administration and . . . aligning their strategies with expected policy changes,” said Trier Bryant, a former DEI executive at Goldman Sachs and Twitter.

Last week, the social media group Meta showed all the developments at once. It abandoned its content moderation policies, added longtime Trump friend and Ultimate Fighting Championship chief executive Dana White to its board, moved its chief diversity officer to a new role, and dropped its goals to promote racial and gender diversity among its managers and suppliers.

Founder Mark Zuckerberg later joined a podcast hosted by Joe Rogan, who backed Trump in the election, and lamented the rise of “culturally neutered” companies. “I think having a culture that celebrates aggression more has its own merits that are really positive,” Zuckerberg said.

Liberal politicians and investor activists were shocked. “Corporate caving to Trump is very depressing,” said Brad Lander, New York City comptroller and an advocate for sustainable investment. “We have seen many examples in history. That, over time, is the weakening of democracy and fundamental rights.

But companies, executives and analysts argue that the motives driving the changes are complex and reflect more than a desire to defer to the incoming president.

The situation for their customers is changing, executives argue, and court rulings and state and federal regulatory reviews, especially the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision last year that banned affirmative action in colleges, undermined the foundation of diversity and climate programs.

For many, the new administration offers a great opportunity to roll back some of the more restrictive rules implemented during President Joe Biden’s administration and reverse tax and regulatory policy in their favor.

David Solomon, the chief executive of Goldman Sachs, recently praised the incoming Trump administration for “running a growth playbook”.

“I am very optimistic that this administration will run a very pro-growth agenda,” Solomon said at a Reuters event.

Tech leaders have made some of the most high-profile moves on Trump and conservative values, in a pre-emptive effort to mend fences. Apple’s Tim Cook, Google’s Sundar Pichai and OpenAI’s Sam Altman all joined Meta’s Zuckerberg and Amazon’s Bezos in pledging $1mn to fund Trump’s inauguration, and Pichai also flew to Mar-a-Lago. Trump has previously claimed that Google was “tricked” into hiding positive coverage about him.

“It’s a statement of the lack of confidence and backbone among tech executives,” said Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, senior associate dean for leadership studies at the Yale School of Management. He described their contributions to Trump’s inauguration as serving as a “tithing scheme” for the president-elect.

In the financial sector, the most visible shift since Trump’s election is around climate change. All the big Wall Street banks and many big money managers have joined industry groups seeking to use their financial power to cut carbon emissions.

BlackRock, the target of conservative state reviews and lawsuits in the first round of support for sustainable investing, clearly cited legal and regulatory issues for its departure from the Net Zero Asset Managers initiative last week. .

Even the way people on Wall Street talk and interact is changing. Bankers and financiers say Trump’s victory has fueled those who are angry with the “doctrinal awakening” and feel they need to self-censor or change their speech to avoid offending young people. partner, women, minorities or the disabled.

“I feel free,” said a tall banker. “We can say ‘retard’ and ‘pussy’ without fear of cancellation. . . it’s a new dawn.”

Some Wall Streeters also feel able to accept making money openly, without nodding to any broader social goals. “Most of us don’t need to kiss ass because, like Trump, we love America and capitalism,” said one.

Consumer-facing groups, on the other hand, have become more careful to avoid seeming “woke”, they are less likely to trigger the kind of boycotts faced by Target and Bud Light in marketing that celebrates the gay and transgender people. That backlash happened before the election.

But the shift to the right was so rapid that some groups were caught. After the recent terrorist attack in New Orleans, the chief executive of the insurance group Allstate, Tom Wilson, drew strong criticism saying “we have to be stronger together by overcoming the addiction to division and negativity”.

Conservative activists accused Wilson, whose company sponsored a high-profile American football game in the city, of downplaying the killing while pushing progressive causes. Allstate tried to explain that the statement “reflects a broader commitment to promote trust and positivity in communities across the country”.

Other major corporate shifts have been in DEI’s efforts, especially since the Supreme Court’s decision against the use of race-based college admissions in June 2023. Trump in the election.

Walmart stopped considering race and gender in awarding supplier contracts, ended racial equity training for employees, and pulled funding for the Center for Racial Equity, which it set up with a $100 million pledge after of the George Floyd protests. McDonald’s last week dropped percentage goals for women and non-white managers, stopped asking suppliers to sign a DEI oath and said it would now refer to its diversity team as a Global Inclusion Team.

Both companies focus on legal issues but also changing circumstances. McDonald’s cited “an evolving landscape”, while saying it was committed to inclusion. Walmart said its innovative approach shows that “we are ready to change with our partners and customers who represent all of America. We travel and know that we are not perfect, but every decision comes from in a place that wants to develop a sense of belonging.

Consultants and other corporate advisers said the changing landscape also gives companies a way to rethink or scrap environmental and diversity goals they have yet to meet. .

“They don’t want to be caught promising and not delivering,” said Richard Edelman, who advises corporate leaders as chief executive of Edelman, a public relations group. “Companies are still committed to diversity and they’re committed to inclusion, they don’t want to guarantee outcomes.”

It’s unclear whether the conservative turn will outlast the progressive positions companies have taken in 2020. Bryant, the former DEI executive who is now chief executive of consulting firm Pathfinder, said many of the changes in policy that seems aimed at easing political scrutiny rather than substantive policy change.

“Maya Angelou said, ‘When people show you who they are, believe them.’ When companies show who they are, believe them too,” he said.

Reporting by Brooke Masters, James Fontanella-Khan, Gregory Meyer, Taylor Nicole Rogers, and Patrick Temple-West in New York and Tabby Kinder in San Francisco