‘The Apprentice’ — with Don Jr. as host — being discussed as Amazon explores reboot: report

Amazon is exploring a reboot of The Apprentice — and is weighing whether to install Donald Trump Jr. as host of the reality show that helped catapult his father to the presidency, according to a report.

Executives at the company have held internal discussions about reviving the long-running series, though talks remain in early stages and no formal outreach has been made to the Trump family, the Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday.

If it moves forward, the reboot would stream on Prime Video, which inherited the show’s library after Amazon acquired MGM in 2022.

The original show, which premiered in 2004, was a breakout hit that drew as many as 20 million viewers and helped recast Donald Trump as a larger-than-life business authority.

Jeff Zucker, then a top executive at NBC, was instrumental in greenlighting “The Apprentice” and backing Trump as its central figure — a decision that helped elevate Trump’s national profile.

Ironically, Zucker later went on to run CNN, the cable network Trump would repeatedly attack as “fake news” during his presidency.

Amazon’s reported interest in rebooting “The Apprentice” comes on the heels of its splashy investment in a documentary about Melania Trump — a deal that raised eyebrows across Hollywood and Washington alike.

The company paid $40 million for the rights to the film, which follows the first lady in the weeks surrounding the start of her husband’s second term, a price tag that was nearly three times higher than competing offers.

Amazon then poured roughly $35 million more into a global marketing blitz, including ads during NFL games and a massive theatrical rollout.

The project drew internal scrutiny within Amazon, with some employees questioning both the scale of the spending and the optics of doing business with a sitting first family.

Critics also pointed to Melania Trump’s reported editorial control over the film, arguing it blurred the line between documentary filmmaking and political messaging.

Amazon has pushed back on that characterization, saying it licensed the project “for one reason and one reason only — because we think customers are going to love it.”

The relationship between Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and President Donald Trump has shifted sharply in Trump’s second term, moving from open hostility to what critics describe as pragmatic alignment.

After years of clashes, Bezos, who remains the company’s largest shareholder, struck a more conciliatory tone following Trump’s 2024 win, praising his “extraordinary political comeback” and signaling openness to working with a deregulation-focused administration.

That shift has coincided with major developments for Amazon, including tens of billions in federal AI and cloud contracts alongside continued scrutiny from regulators such as the FTC.

Meanwhile, Bezos’s ownership of The Washington Post has become a flashpoint, with his decision to block a Kamala Harris endorsement and refocus the opinion section triggering top newsroom resignations, a loss of roughly 250,000 subscribers and ongoing annual losses exceeding $100 million.

The Post has sought comment from Amazon, the White House, Don Jr. and the Trump Organization.