Apple CEO Tim Cook told employees in an internal memo that he is “heartbroken” and urged “de-escalation” following the killing of 37-year-old ICU nurse Alex Pretti in Minneapolis, joining other prominent corporate executives weighing in on immigration enforcement.
The chief executive added that he had also shared his views with President Trump this week in what he characterized as a “good conversation.”
“I appreciate his openness to engaging on issues that matter to us all,” Cook said.
Cook’s statement comes after the CEOs of dozens of Minnesota-based companies, including 3M, UnitedHealth Group and Target, signed an open letter from the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce addressing Pretti’s killing by Border Patrol agents. The CEOs demanded the “immediate de-escalation of tensions.”
However, the letter from Minnesota-based CEOs stopped short of condemning federal immigration enforcement operations in Minneapolis or calling on the White House to take any specific steps, such as pulling ICE agents out of the city.
Leadership experts said the missive’s cautious tone reflects executives’ attempts to avoid crossing the Trump administration while signaling to customers that their companies are attentive to community concerns.
“You can kind of see the effort in the CEO statement to default to rhetoric we’ve seen for years that doesn’t get into politics, but shows that you are about communities,” Allison Taylor, a clinical associate professor of business and society at New York University Stern School of Business, told CBS News.
She also noted the significance of the letter’s dozens of signatories, which prevents Mr. Trump from singling out any one company. “You’re seeing a sensible playbook. No one is going out there alone,” she said.
Hundreds of employees from top tech firms such as Amazon, Google and Meta have signed a more forceful letter, urging their CEOs to publicly condemn ICE’s actions and cancel all company contracts with the agency. The employees are also asking company leaders to call the White House and “demand that ICE leave our cities.”
OpenAI’s Sam Altman weighs in on ICE
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has also addressed the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown in Minnesota internally, the New York Times reported Monday.
“What’s happening with ICE is going too far,” he said in part in an internal Slack message to the ChatGPT maker’s employees, the New York Times’ DealBook reported. In the same message, Altman praised Mr. Trump, calling him “a very strong leader.”
OpenAI did not immediately respond to CBS News’ request for a copy of the message.
On Jan. 26, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei issued a response to what he called “the horror we’re seeing in Minnesota.”
He said the unrest highlights “the importance of preserving democratic values and rights at home.”
John Challenger, CEO of global outplacement and executive coaching firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas, told CBS News that business leaders currently face the challenge of keeping workers calm and focused on their jobs despite the strong feelings around the shootings in Minneapolis.
“Executives are trying to respond to this very high-emotion, very difficult time when the mood is dark and people are angry,” he said. “They are worried not only about their customers and how they are reacting, but also about what’s happening inside their own workplaces within their own teams.”
He also said that a corporation taking a stance on any politically-charged news event can be very “high risk” if leaders miss the mark and are perceived by staff as disingenuous.
