‘Sundar is his name’: Donald Trump calls Pichai a ‘monster’; Google CEO has a witty comeback

US President Donald Trump’s unusual description of Google CEO Sundar Pichai as a “monster” has drawn attention after a video of the exchange surfaced online.

The interaction took place during a White House meeting on Tuesday involving some of the biggest names in the global technology industry, with discussions centred on the development of frontier artificial intelligence.

What did Trump say about Sundar Pichai?

During an interaction with reporters, Trump turned to Pichai and asked, “Sundar, you want to say something?”

As the Google CEO began, “First of all, thanks…”, Trump interrupted him and continued praising him.

“This guy is a monster, and nobody knows him. What a great life! To be a monster and not have to go through this. All you have to know is – SUNDARR! Sundar is his name,” Trump said.

Pichai responded to the unusual description with a joke.

“Hopefully a better tagline than I’m a monster!” Pichai said, prompting laughter from people around them.

Social media reacts to Trump’s ‘monster’ comment

The exchange quickly drew reactions on social media, with users commenting on Trump’s choice of words and the reactions of those present.

One user wrote, “Another signature trump backhanded compliment lol”

Another user wrote, “wow zoom into all of the background people’s faces and watch each time he starts saying Sundar is a monster. Each face tells an interesting story.”

A third user wrote, “BUAHHAHA nobody knows him. Because Trump doesn’t know him, so he assumes no one else does,”

Sundar Pichai, Zuckerberg, Musk among tech leaders at White House

The exchange came during a White House meeting convened by Trump to discuss responsibilities for technology companies developing frontier AI.

The meeting brought together several prominent technology executives, including Google CEO Sundar Pichai, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Greg Brockman of OpenAI, Elon Musk, CEO of xAI, and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang.

The discussions also focused on “Super-Intelligence”, a new term referenced in the context of the development of increasingly advanced AI systems.

The gathering comes as major technology companies continue to invest in frontier AI and debate how companies developing the technology should approach its development and responsibilities.