One year into the second Trump presidency, it’s pretty clear that his regime’s operating principle is not really “America First” but “Trump First.”
Or maybe more accurately, “What’s in it for Trump and the wealthy elites who benefit from his cronyism and corrupt rule?”
It’s the rich and powerful taking care of the rich and powerful. Your average American? Not so much.
Millions of American families are finding out just before Christmas that they’re about to get slammed with brutal hikes in the cost of health insurance. Why? Because Trump and congressional Republicans decided that giving trillions in tax cuts to corporations and wealthy Americans is more important than keeping health care affordable for individuals and families.
That’s a recurring theme of Trump 2.0. Trump throws around populist-sounding rhetoric, but his actions are about taking care of his friends at the top.
That’s becoming clearer to the American people, who have lost faith in Trump’s economic policies — with good reason. Trump campaigned on a promise to bring down higher prices, but that’s not what his tariffs, trade wars and tax policies have brought us. Many American families are struggling. But Trump responds with gaslighting, pretending that the cost of living is way down under his watch. He recently claimed that the very term “affordability” is just “a fake narrative” that “doesn’t mean anything to anybody.”
News flash: “Affordability” certainly meant something to millions of people who went to the polls in November, or even just recently to many of those who voted in Tennessee.
Now, I will grant that affordability probably isn’t a big problem for the kind of people who showed up to the “Great Gatsby” party at Mar-a-Lago. It’s probably not a concern for the crowd that Trump is planning to entertain in the $300 million gold-plated ballroom he’s so focused on.
That ballroom project gives Trump a way to shake down corporate bigwigs who are willing to pay for favorable treatment from the White House. And they’re getting it.
The New York Times reported last month that Trump’s Treasury Department and IRS have been issuing new rules to help “some of the country’s most profitable companies and wealthiest investors” get around laws designed to make sure they pay at least a minimum in taxes.
Some tax experts believe Trump’s team is effectively and illegitimately rewriting laws to give hundreds of billions in tax breaks to “giant private equity firms, crypto companies, foreign real estate investors, insurance providers and a variety of multinational corporations.”
And all that is on top of the trillions in tax cuts included in the Republican budget that favor corporations and the ultrarich — the same budget bill that included massive cuts to health care and food stamps.
There are other ways the Trump White House is taking care of connected insiders at the expense of the American people.
Consider Ghislaine Maxwell, the convicted accomplice to notorious child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein. As the public demanded the release of government files on Epstein, Trump sent a Department of Justice lawyer to interview Maxwell in jail who secured a public comment that she’d never seen Trump do anything wrong.
Just like that, Maxwell was transferred to a cushier prison. Then we learned from whistleblowers that she’s basically being treated like she’s in a four-star hotel, with special meals and treatment, including access to a puppy. So much for “tough on crime.”
Maxwell is reportedly asking Trump to release her from prison. It would be shocking, but not surprising. After all, Trump has repeatedly used the presidential pardon power to free con men and other people who are in a position to benefit him.
In the spring, Trump pardoned a guy convicted of tax evasion after the criminal’s mother contributed $1 million to Trump’s campaign.
In October, Trump pardoned a billionaire felon, Changpen Zhao, who the Justice Department accused of causing “significant harm to U.S. National Security” by allowing his crypto exchange to be used for money laundering that financed criminals and terrorist organizations.
Turns out Zhao’s company also helped funnel billions into a Trump family cryptocurrency company around the time he sought a pardon.
“The influence that money played in securing this pardon is unprecedented,” according to Elizabeth Oyer, who used to oversee vetting for pardons at the Justice Department. “The self-dealing aspect of the pardon in terms of the benefit that it conferred on President Trump, and his family, and people in his inner circle is also unprecedented.”
Americans are wising up and rejecting Trump’s greed and corruption. Signs suggest that what moves voters in next year’s elections could be the contrast between the self-enrichment of Trump and his billionaire cronies and his “let them eat cake” attitude toward the people he and his party are abandoning.
