US President Donald Trump on Tuesday, April 21, paid tribute to outgoing Apple chief executive officer (CEO) Tim Cook, calling him “an incredible guy” in a Truth Social post that recounted a series of favours he said he had done for the tech executive, while also declaring that Cook had outperformed even company co-founder Steve Jobs.
The post came hours after Apple announced that Cook, who has led the Cupertino-based company since 2011, would step down in September and be succeeded by John Ternus, currently senior vice president of hardware engineering. Cook will remain involved with the company as executive chairman.
In a lengthy post, Trump said Cook’s tenure had surpassed what even Jobs might have achieved had he lived longer.
“I have always been a big fan of Tim Cook, and likewise, Steve Jobs, but if Steve was not taken from the Planet Earth so young, and ran the company instead of Tim, the company would have done well, but nowhere near as well as it has under Tim,” Trump wrote.
Trump said his relationship with Cook began during his first term in office, when the Apple chief reached out with what he described as “a fairly large problem” that only a sitting president could resolve.
“When I got the call I said, wow, it’s Tim Apple (Cook!) calling, how big is that? I was very impressed with myself to have the head of Apple calling to ‘kiss my ass,'” Trump wrote, adding that he resolved the matter “quickly and effectively.”
The president said that over the course of his time in office, Cook called him periodically, “but never too much,” and that he assisted him on “3 or 4 BIG HELPS.” He noted, however, that he did not always comply with Cook’s requests, particularly when he felt Cook was “too aggressive in his ask.”
Trump contrasted this with what he described as the ineffective and expensive alternative of hiring Washington consultants. “Most people would have paid millions of dollars to a consultant… The fees would be paid but the job would not have gotten done,” he said.
Cook, who took charge of Apple following the death of Steve Jobs in 2011, oversaw a period of extraordinary growth at the company. During his tenure, Apple’s market valuation rose by more than USD 3.6 trillion. In his own statement on the transition, Cook called leading Apple “the greatest privilege of my life.”
Trump concluded his post saying Cook “had an AMAZING career, almost incomparable, and will go on and continue to do great work for Apple, and whatever else he chooses to work on.”Ternus is set to take charge as CEO on September 1.
This post was last modified on April 21, 2026 7:32 pm