Trump embarrassed Joe Biden's cabinet, whose total was a "measly" 118 million, 2881 times less. That didn't stop Republicans from talking about a corrupt ruling elite preying on ordinary Americans.
This text has been auto-translated from Polish.
Oxfam's annual reports on inequality in the world have managed to get us used to the fact that things are bad, and will only get worse. This time we read again about the record wealth of billionaires (up from $13 trillion to $15), their record number (already 2,769) and finally record profits. While the number of people living in poverty has not decreased since 1990, the wealth of billionaires is growing faster than ever - by six billion dollars every day, and the ten richest among them are gaining 100 million every 24 hours.
This is also leading to an increase in the political influence of billionaires, but rarely do we have the opportunity to see their power so stripped bare and devoid of any camouflage, as was the case at Donald Trump's inauguration. The selection of guests and their seating made it clear who really rules the United States, and to a large extent the world.
Oligarchs in the front row...
Seated in the seats of honor, next to the family of the president-elect and former presidents, and in front of at least members of the new cabinet, were a group of billionaires who head the largest technology companies: the owner of Tesla and Platform X Elon Musk, Google CEO Sundar Pichai, Amazon chief Jeff Bezos and, last but not least, the head of Facebook Mark Zuckerberg, among others. The latter has been sucking up to the new administration for the past few weeks, as manifested by the announcement of less active moderation on Meta's platforms and the simultaneous discontinuation of fact-checking, which in practice means greater tolerance for homophonic or xenophobic content, as well as increased coverage of conspiracy theories.
Trump's most important ally among those mentioned, however, is undoubtedly Elon Musk, who, prior to the November vote, used his own platform to agitate for the Republicans and generously funded their campaign - the value of support from the world's richest man reached as high as $277 million. The fresh-faced oligarch, while not giving up his business activities, will also join the new cabinet, and even before Trump's inauguration he managed to attend a series of meetings with world leaders, epitomizing the progressive fusion of financial and political elites.
It is no coincidence to use here a word rather associated with Russia and the billionaires there who rapidly enfranchised themselves after the collapse of the USSR. The seizure of power by oligarchs prevented the real democratization of many post-Soviet countries at the turn of the century, and now in the US, too, the line between the world of big business and government circles is becoming increasingly blurred. Even if the two circles have never been far from each other, their fusion is just reaching another level, with Trump himself and his closest associates being the best examples.
And in government administration
During the election campaign, the Republican candidate portrayed himself as a man of the people, thundered against liberal elites and reached for the deep fryer at McDonald's, helping voters forget that he lives in a golden palace every day. Even after his victory, Donald Trump quickly dropped appearances, appointing mostly billionaires to key positions - among the members of the new administration, as many as a dozen boast such wealth, and the combined value of their fortunes is a record $340 billion. Trump thus topped his first term and at the same time embarrassed Joe Biden's cabinet, whose total value was a "measly" 118 million, or 2881 times less. That didn't stop Republicans from talking about a corrupt ruling elite preying on ordinary Americans.
This is to be changed by a team of billionaires, including real estate magnates and stock market investors. Education will be the responsibility of Linda McMahon, spouse of a wrestling icon and former president of World Wrestling Entartainment, whose mission will be to effectively dismantle her department, since teaching issues, according to Trump, should be handled by individual states, not the federal government. As compared to his colleagues, Marco Rubio, with a fortune of $5 million, which still places him in the top 1 percent of the richest Americans, can be considered a plebeian.
The aforementioned Musk, the world's richest man, will in turn head the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), which is supposed to be in charge of cutting the federal government and making it more productive at the same time. Republicans see no problem with the fact that savings in state institutions will be sought by the owner of several large companies, some of which (like SpaceX) depend on government subsidies while competing with public entities. The very name of the new department, by the way, refers to the cryptocurrency promoted by Musk, but the concept of conflict of interest remains unknown to the new administration.
Tiktok thanks Trump, or politics under big tech
In early January, the Joe Biden administration's ban on the TikTok platform's continued operations in the U.S. was set to go into effect due to concerns about the security of data collected by the Chinese app and the risk of it being used to sow disinformation. When TikTok resumed its operation in the US after a brief hiatus, users were greeted with the news that they owed the ability to continue using the platform to "President Trump's efforts."
Throwing a lifeline to TikTok by the new-old president may come as a surprise if we look at his policies in the previous term. After all, Trump at one time wanted to ban the platform, effectively doing the same thing that the Biden administration eventually did. What led to such a change of views in the US leader? Some point to the fact that right-wing developers have a clear advantage in the Chinese app, so campaigning on TikTok helped Trump win the election.
On top of that, there is a plan for a partial takeover of the platform - Trump's condition for lifting the ban is to turn TikTok into a company half-owned by the US side. To whom specifically will this piece of the pie fall? The president himself has spoken of a number of interested parties, and it is possible that his goal is to acquire another social media outlet with friendly management.
The guest list at the inauguration promises a presidency in close alliance with tech giants, including those once at odds with Trump (like Mark Zuckenberg's Met). The president is promising generous subsidies to the sector, while defending its interests in a clash with at least the European Union, which is trying to regulate US giants. Stopping U.S. expansion in this aspect may be more difficult than blocking Trump's plans for Greenland.
