Jake Johnson
While
President-elect Donald Trump is expected to hail the "start of a thrilling
new era of national success" during his inaugural speech on Monday,
progressives said the presence of some of the nation's most powerful
billionaires at the event signals that the incoming administration's agenda
will prioritize the success the country's wealthiest.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg (L), Apple CEO
Tim Cook (C), and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos (R) attend services as part
of Inauguration ceremonies at St. John's Church on January 20, 2025 in
Washington, D.C. (Photo: Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
Meta CEO Mark
Zuckerberg, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, and Tesla CEO Elon Musk are among the
billionaires set to attend the inauguration ceremony. The trio will "have
a prominent spot," according to NBC News, "seated together on the
platform with other notable guests, including Trump's Cabinet nominees and
elected officials."
“Elon Musk, Mark
Zuckerberg, and Jeff Bezos know a thing or two about screwing over workers.
It's no wonder they're sitting ringside for the inauguration of a man who's
built a career out of cheating workers, ripping off families, and skipping out
on paying taxes," Maurice Mitchell, national director of the Working
Families Party, said in a statement Monday, characterizing the mega-rich
attendees as "billionaires' row."
"The
billionaires in attendance today have one goal: to get even richer by gutting
our health care, public education, and Social Security," Mitchell added.
"We're going to expose their grift, and bring new people with us along the
way, until working people are the ones with the power, not billionaire
bosses."
A number of
other high-profile billionaires are expected to attend the president-elect's
swearing-in ceremony, including OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Apple CEO Tim
Cook—both of whom donated $1 million to Trump's inaugural fund, which brought
in record-shattering donations.
"Trump's
White House is government by the billionaires, for the billionaires," Rep.
Greg Casar (D-Texas), chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, said in a
statement ahead of the inauguration. "Lobbyists and corporations have
donated over $200 million to today's inauguration of Donald Trump—a small price
to pay for buying off history's most corrupt grifter-in-chief. On Day One,
Trump has shown us who he really is—a fighter for the wealthy, not the working
class."
In addition to
the outside billionaires backing Trump's second administration, which is
pushing for another round of tax breaks for the rich and large corporations,
the president-elect has proposed staffing his White House with at least 13
billionaires—from education secretary nominee Linda McMahon to treasury
secretary pick Scott Bessent.
Including
Musk—who is set to co-lead an advisory commission tasked with gutting federal
regulations and spending—the combined net worth of Trump's incoming
administration could exceed $460 billion, according to ABC News.
In a Fox News op-ed
published Sunday, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) wrote that "we must not
allow billionaire oligarchs to buy our government."
"Trump has
repeatedly claimed that he wants the Republican Party to represent the needs of
working people," Sanders continued. "Well, you don't do that by
surrounding yourself with the richest people in the world and putting 13
billionaires in your Cabinet, many of whom have a direct financial stake in the
industries they are charged with regulating."
Eduardo
Vasco
The
United States is experiencing “a dangerous concentration of power in the hands
of a few super-rich people,” that is, an “oligarchy.” This is how President Joe
Biden addressed American citizens in his farewell speech from the White House,
broadcast on national television. Indirectly referring to the billionaires
linked to Donald Trump, he declared that their “extreme wealth, power, and
influence” are “literal” threats to democracy.
Since
all the misfortunes that have been occurring in the U.S. and around the world
are attributed exclusively to the far right, it is hidden, however, that this
concentration of power and wealth has been going on for a long time and is
nothing new. The conclusion of the bourgeois revolution with the unification of
the country after the civil war meant the transition of power from the agrarian
bourgeoisie, linked to the Democratic Party, to the industrial bourgeoisie,
represented by the Republican Party. Already at that time, the great capitalist
monopolies that would control U.S. politics to this day were being formed.
“The
Rockefellers in oil, the Carnegies and Fricks in steel, the Morgans in banking,
or the Harrimans and Hills in railroads—these were the men who had an
influential voice in the Republican Party, and also in the Democratic Party,
from 1865 to 1901,” wrote historian Arthur S. Link. “They financed political
campaigns and received government rewards in the form of concessions for public
services, land, tax exemptions, or tariff protections.”
After
World War II—in which the U.S. entry was a necessity for these monopolies—the
concentration of political power by the monopolies was consolidated. When he
came to power in 1953, Dwight Eisenhower filled his cabinet with
representatives of the big companies: Charles Wilson, of General Motors, for
the Pentagon; George Humphrey, of M.A. Hanna Steel Company, for the Treasury;
Sinclair Weeks, an industrialist, for Commerce; Arthur Summerfield, from the
automobile industry, for the Post and Telegraph Office; Ezra Taft Benson, from
the agricultural markets, for Agriculture; and the wealthy corporate lawyer
John Foster Dulles for the State Department. Together with Douglas McKay, from
the Interior, and Herbert Brownell, from Justice, they formed a cabinet that
was described by the New Republic as having “eight millionaires and a fireman.”
The fireman was Secretary of Labor Martin Durkin, a union leader from the
American Firemen and Plumbers Association. A few months later, Durkin would be
replaced by the big retailer James Mitchell, and the Department of Health,
Education, and Welfare would be created under the responsibility of Oveta Culp
Hobby, wife of the communications entrepreneur William P. Hobby.
Perhaps
one of the governments most famous for its relationship with the “oligarchy,”
as Biden put it, was that of George W. Bush. As an oil businessman himself (in
addition to his contacts with other areas, such as arms), his vice president
was Dick Cheney (an oil businessman), whose wife worked on the board of the
arms giant Lockheed. Donald Rumsfeld, who was his Secretary of Defense (and
also Gerald Ford’s), had businesses in the pharmaceutical and electronics
industries, and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was an advisor to Chevron.
It is no surprise that many of the companies directly linked to the Bush Jr.
administration were among the major beneficiaries of the invasion of Iraq.
The great businessman of the Trump administration
Donald
Trump returns to the United States government maintaining this tradition. A
tycoon with businesses in various sectors (from real estate to entertainment),
he has appointed major businesspersons to key positions (Scott Bessent for
Treasury; Linda McMahon for Education; Howard Lutnick for Commerce; Chris
Wright for Energy; Doug Burgum for Interior; Susi Willes to head the White
House and Steven Witkoff for the Middle East). But the big name will not occupy
an official position: Elon Musk will be in charge of the Department of
Government Efficiency, to reduce public spending by a third.
The
richest man in the world and the largest donor to Trump’s campaign (220 million
dollars), Musk has become so close to the new president that he has already
become a target of the most radical MAGA ideologues, such as Steve Bannon, who
accused him of betraying Trumpism by defending the possibility of increasing
the immigration of skilled workers to work in his companies, receiving lower
wages and filling the vacancies of American workers. The technology billionaire
also upset the traditional sectors of the military-industrial complex when he
proposed to the government that Lockheed’s arms contracts be replaced by drones
developed in Silicon Valley.
In
fact, Musk will not have contracts with the U.S. government after Trump’s
second term. Since Joe Biden, SpaceX has been building a network of spy
satellites for intelligence agencies and the Pentagon. Outside the United
States, Musk began investing in the extraction of Argentine lithium to supply
Tesla. Since then, he has also become friends with Javier Milei and supported
his election, apparently in exchange for Argentine lithium concessions. In a TV
show after being elected, Milei revealed that Musk was “extremely interested in
Argentine lithium”, assuring that he would change the country’s legislation to
guarantee “a legal framework that respects the property rights” of the
businessman and other American companies. Shortly after, Milei also announced
the “deregulation of satellite internet services to allow the entry of
companies like Starlink”.
This
is certainly one of the reasons for Trump’s rapprochement with Milei. A few
years ago, Musk also revealed that he had supported the 2019 coup in Bolivia,
which has the world’s largest lithium reserves. “We will coup whoever we want,”
he posted at the time. This history, combined with recent tensions with
President Lula and the Brazilian Supreme Court, raises alarm bells about the
imminent possibility of Brazil being one of the next in line for the coups
mentioned by Musk. Bolsonaro’s supporters are desperate to return to government
and replace the Chinese automakers that recently arrived in the country with
Tesla, as well as to ensure that the Chinese company SpaceSail, which signed
contracts with Telebrás, is eliminated from the competition with Starlink.
Judging
by his frequent statements that go far beyond the area of spending cuts, for
which Musk was appointed by Trump, the owner of X both influences and expresses
the opinion of the president himself and sectors of his new government. Even
wealthy countries such as Canada, Germany and the United Kingdom have been the
target of Musk’s greed, as he supports the annexation of the former and the
rise of the far right in the governments of the other two. All these cases,
both in the Americas and in Europe, reveal an aggressive interventionist policy
– a tendency of part of the new Trump administration, divided between
isolationists and conservative “internationalists”. It is logical that this
aggressiveness is not motivated by any ideology, but rather by the need for
profits of Musk and other businessmen in the Trump administration.
Charles
Wilson, a large shareholder in General Motors who was appointed Secretary of
Defense by Eisenhower, declared during his Senate hearing in 1953: “What is
good for the country is also good for General Motors and vice versa.” In this
sense, nothing has changed in the last 70 years. Only that GM has given way to
Tesla.
Umar A Farooq
Nearly a third
of US voters who cast their ballots for former President Joe Biden in 2020
decided against voting for Kamala Harris in the 2024 presidential elections
because Biden supported Israel's war on Gaza, a new poll has shown.
The poll,
conducted by the Institute of Middle East Understanding and YouGov, attempts to
provide a possible answer to the question of why Harris received six million
fewer votes than Biden received in 2020.
The survey,
which was released last week, found that 29 percent of Americans who voted for
Biden in 2020 and didn't vote for Harris in 2024 cited "ending Israel’s
violence in Gaza" as their reason for withholding their vote.
"Vice
President Harris lost votes because of the Biden administration’s support for
Israel’s genocide of Palestinians in Gaza," IMEU said in a statement
announcing the poll.
That reason
surpassed the economy, immigration, healthcare, and abortion, all of which have
historically been major voter issues in past presidential elections. Foreign
policy is often a low factor in voter turnout.
Harris became
the Democratic nominee last July after Biden dropped out of the race following
a dismal performance in the first debate against Donald Trump.
While many
Democratic voters were hopeful that Harris would break from Biden's
unconditional and unrelenting support for Israel's war on Gaza, Harris made no
effort to create any distance between her and her predecessor on the issue.
At the
Democratic National Convention in August 2024, when Harris was to be officially
nominated as the Democratic nominee for president, the DNC was met with major
pro-Palestinian protests outside the convention hall.
Inside the
convention, DNC delegates aligned with the Uncommitted Movement called on
convention leaders to allow a Palestinian speaker to speak on the main stage.
The request was unequivocally denied.
While Harris
offered a softer tone and evoked empathy with the Palestinians killed and under
constant Israeli bombardment, Harris and those around her continuously
reiterated support for Israel's war effort.
"Let me
just make this clear: The vice president has been and will be a strong
supporter of Israel as a secure democratic and Jewish state, and she will
always ensure that Israel can defend itself, period. Because that’s who Kamala
Harris is," Doug Emhoff, Harris' husband, said during a Zoom call in July
2024.
The IMEU and
YouGov poll surveyed 604 voters between 20 December 2024 and 7 January 2025.
Democrats failed
to listen to voters
In the 2024
presidential election, Harris received 75 million votes compared to Trump's 77
million votes.
Given that the
overall drop-off in voter turnout was smaller in several swing states in 2024,
it's difficult to definitively conclude that one issue alone led previous Biden
voters to not vote for Harris.
However, the
IMEU and YouGov poll found that 2020 Biden voters were three times more likely
than not to vote for Harris if she "pledged to break from President
Biden's policy toward Gaza by promising to withhold additional weapons to
Israel".
Among that same
group of voters, 53 percent said that Biden's support for Israel was "too
much".
During the 2024
election cycle, leading figures within the Democratic Party framed Harris as
the better alternative for voters outraged by the US support for Israel's war
on Gaza.
The war, which
began after the Hamas-led attacks on southern Israel in October 2023, has
killed more than 46,000 Palestinians while also destroying much of Gaza's
civilian infrastructure and displacing most of the enclave's population of two
million Palestinians.
Alexandria
Ocasio-Cortez, a leading progressive figure in the Democratic Party, claimed in
August 2024 that Harris was "working tirelessly" for a ceasefire in
Gaza.
However, a
ceasefire between Hamas and Israel was finally achieved after Trump was elected
as president, and after his incoming envoy travelled to the region to push
Israel to accept a deal.
"The
Democratic Party needs to come to terms with the real reasons it lost the
presidency in November, including that after over a year of unprecedented
protests and calls for Biden to stop sending weapons to Israel, party
leadership failed to listen to its own voters who overwhelmingly want their
government to end its complicity in Israel’s genocide in Gaza," IMEU said.
No comments:
Post a Comment