Bezos defends billionaires and AI in CNBC interview, praises Trump
Amazon founder Jeff Bezos used a wide-ranging CNBC interview to dispute the 'buy borrow die' tax strategy, reject AI-bubble warnings and praise Donald Trump for what he called pro-employer policies. He argued that wealthy Americans already shoulder a heavy tax burden and warned against pulling capital out of long-term AI investment.
Bezos used the wide-ranging CNBC interview to push back on the much-discussed 'buy borrow die' tax strategy, in which wealthy Americans are said to avoid income tax by borrowing against appreciating assets. The Amazon founder said his own annual tax bill runs into the hundreds of millions of dollars and called the popular framing 'just not true.' He stopped short of endorsing a federal wealth tax aimed at billionaires.
On AI, Bezos rejected concerns that current spending on data centres and model training amounts to a bubble. 'You shouldn't worry about it,' he told CNBC, arguing that sustained capital expenditure by Amazon and its largest peers will lift long-run productivity. He linked Amazon's cloud business, Prometheum work and Blue Origin's launch cadence to what he framed as a once-in-a-generation AI build-out.
The politically charged segment came when Bezos described the Trump administration as 'good for corporations and good for jobs.' The praise from the former Washington Post owner drew immediate attention given his past public disagreements with the president. CNBC analysts said the remarks fit a broader pattern of Big Tech executives publicly aligning with the White House on tax, regulatory and energy policy.
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