By Kai Godsey
Ever since Donald Trump won his nonconsecutive second term as president, the word “oligarchy” has been a trending topic among left-leaning politicians like Bernie Sanders. The term spiked in Google searches after Joe Biden warned that an oligarchy was taking shape in America in his farewell address on Jan. 15. In an oligarchy, the power rests with a small group of elites who influence government policies with their own interests in mind. They are often the wealthiest business moguls in the nation who constantly advocate for legislation that directly benefits them, particularly through endorsements and lobbying.
At his inauguration, Trump was surrounded by the world’s wealthiest tech billionaires, including Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, Sundar Pichai and Jeff Bezos, despite previously appealing to the working class in his campaign. While the subject of oligarchy may have gained greater public attention since Trump’s reelection, America had an oligarchical problem long before the Trump Era.
I first learned about the word “oligarchy” in a high school history class during Trump’s first term. I remember there were posters stapled along the classroom walls that defined political and economic ideologies and types of government, including oligarchies. Although I struggled to pronounce the word, the moment I laid eyes on the definition, I was immediately reminded of the American government. Yet, the poster listed Russia, Mexico, Saudi Arabia and China as oligarchies, while there was no mention of the United States. Despite this, it was evident to me even then that our country was an oligarchy. For instance, between 1981 to 2002, proposed U.S. policies with high support among the economic elite were adopted 45% of the time compared to 18% of those with low elite support.
Fast forward to today with Trump back in office, and the class war has only become more relevant. Upon his return, Trump established the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) through an executive order with multi-billionaire Elon Musk as its executive.
As the head of the DOGE, Musk recently helped Trump launch unprecedented mass layoffs at numerous federal agencies and has said that the United States should “delete entire agencies” from the federal government. In addition, the DOGE has faced several legal challenges for accessing sensitive personal data, including student loan data from the Department of Education and attempting to access sensitive personal data from the Treasury Department. With Musk, the richest person in the world, acting as a ringmaster of the circus, our nation’s governmental structure echoes the characteristics of an oligarchy.
Yet, America had an oligarchical problem even before Trump. In the 2010 case Citizens United v. FEC, the Supreme Court ruled that the federal government could not prohibit independent expenditures from corporations and unions on political campaigns, helping give corporations more influence on our elections. In regards to the last presidential election, the ruling would help allow Elon Musk to form a super PAC to support Trump known as the America PAC, ultimately becoming the largest donor in the 2024 presidential election, donating $288 million to Trump’s presidential campaign.
The oligarchy also impacts our healthcare system. American citizens primarily rely on for-profit health insurance companies for health coverage, yet America is the only high-income country without universal healthcare and medical bills can be costly even for the insured and 8% of people surveyed in the 2023 U.S. Census are uninsured. Furthermore, the Partnership for America’s Health Care Future (PAHCF), an alliance of for-profit pharmaceutical and health insurance companies has regularly helped prevent the passage of the Medicare for All bill through extensive lobbying and creating anti-Medicare ads. Despite clear evidence that our healthcare system is run by financially-driven healthcare company elites, roughly two-thirds of Americans blame both pharmaceutical and health insurance companies for the problems in the healthcare system, while 62% believe the federal government is responsible for ensuring all Americans have healthcare coverage.
America was already an oligarchy long before Trump entered the political arena, but its oligarchs have only been invigorated since Trump’s first presidential term.
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