While warning of the rise of socialism on the left, President Donald Trump is simultaneously conducting his own experiments in economic theory, putting his nationalist spin on American capitalism.
The fear of socialism is built on the idea that government intervention stifles free private enterprise, which capitalists view as the bedrock of American greatness.
Trump, however, is using his view of the national interest — which frequently appears to coincide with his own personal interest — as an excuse to get the government involved in all sorts of markets.
Uncle Sam is now a shareholder
Without asking Congress, Trump’s administration has bought stakes in dozens of private companies. These range from the massive – a nearly $9 billion lifeline to Intel in exchange for nearly 10% of the company – to much smaller stakes in mineral, quantum computing and semiconductor companies, according to a list of 30 investments.
Tracking these investments, which barely register when they’re announced by the Commerce or Defense departments, is Tad DeHaven, a policy analyst at the libertarian-leaning CATO institute.
The administration argues that these are minority stakes and that the government is not interfering in the free market, but DeHaven notes the United States now has a monetary interest in the companies.
Even if the Trump administration says it won’t meddle in the operation of these companies, the genie is out of the bottle and the government will now have an incentive, according to DeHaven, “to privilege the companies that the government has ownership stakes in, and to disfavor competitors, and not just existing competitors, but potential competitors.”
Senator Bernie Sanders, an Independent from Vermont, during a “Get Out The Vote” rally ahead of a primary election at Kings Theater in the Brooklyn borough of New York, on June 18.Adam Gray/Bloomberg/Getty Images
Where Trump and Sanders agree
In an odd bit of political opposites attract, this is an issue that aligns the Trump administration with Sen. Bernie Sanders, the democratic socialist Independent from Vermont who previously ran for president as a Democrat. During debate over the bipartisan CHIPs Act, which allocated taxpayer money to prop up a US semiconductor industry, Sanders pushed unsuccessfully for language that would give the government “a piece” of profits from those companies.
Now, for some of these unprecedented investments, the Trump administration is using money Congress earmarked in the CHIPS Act for the semiconductor industry. The law envisioned federal funding as subsidies to companies. Trump is using it as Sanders might have preferred it.
Dreams of a sovereign wealth fund
Another area where Trump and Sanders agree, at least in principle, is in the need for a US sovereign wealth fund — the kind of massive investment vehicle found in oil-rich countries like Norway and Saudi Arabia, among others.
Sanders would impose a one-time tax on AI companies, seizing 50% of their stock to create a US wealth fund to back social projects.
“The principle is simple: When a public resource generates wealth, the public should share in that wealth,” Sanders said in a statement when he announced the proposal in June.
Last February, Trump directed his Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick to explore the development of a sovereign wealth fund, but those plans have not progressed more than a year later.
The fund, according to the order Trump signed, is meant to “lessen the burden of taxes on American families and small businesses, establish economic security for future generations, and promote United States economic and strategic leadership internationally.”
That language sounds very similar to something Sanders might say. The problem is finding funds to start it when the national debt is approaching $40 trillion.
Republicans, who under Trump twice cut corporate tax rates, would never agree to Sanders’ one-time AI tax. Trump’s claims of foreign investment in the US are wildly overstated.
DeHaven, who opposes a sovereign wealth fund, says the US economy has done quite well without one.
“I think they need to explain how is it the U.S. made it 250 years and became the world’s economic global superpower without this,” he said.
In an aerial view, a container ship arrives at the Port of Oakland on August 1, 2025, in Oakland, California.Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
The examples go on, particularly in foreign policy
Tariffs, at their core, are protectionist and anti-competitive. But “tariff” is Trump’s favorite word, as he would often say on the campaign trail with promises to use them to pay down the debt and reignite American manufacturing. As president, Trump has bragged about using tariffs to exact concessions from foreign governments and to benefit US industries, although the evidence that the policy has worked is lacking.
Trump, however, is determined to continue interfering in markets. After the US Supreme Court rejected his tariff scheme as an unconstitutional overreach, he has tried to find ways to implement tariffs in other ways.
Bailouts for countries Trump likes
Trump has also sought to have the US government intervene in other countries’ economies, potentially distorting markets abroad the way he sometimes has at home. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has overseen support for governments the Trump administration likes with multibillion-dollar efforts to prop up — some might say bail out — currencies in both Japan and Argentina.
The US government has a long history of bailouts – for banks, for airlines, for car companies. But those were generally approved by lawmakers first and drew blowback for the moral hazard and corporate socialism of using taxpayer dollars to rescue companies that made bad bets.
Smothering countries the administration does not like
Meanwhile, the US has stifled commerce in countries it doesn’t like. Cuba is a communist country, so it’s not right to say the US has shut down the energy market there. But the US imposed what is effectively an oil embargo on the nation, plunging Cubans into darkness in an effort to turn the country against its communist regime.
In Iran, the US has also imposed an embargo on ships docking in the Strait of Hormuz. That action, a complicated response put in place when Trump’s war effort there did not go according to plan, has so far failed to ease pressure on the worldwide oil market. In fact, Trump may have launched the war thinking the US could take control of Iran’s oil supply. That’s essentially what happened in Venezuela, where the US captured the country’s then leader, Nicolás Maduro, and essentially took over its oil industry. That Venezuela model has its defenders, but it’s far from free market capitalism.
People spend time at a beach as commercial vessels are anchored in the Strait of Hormuz off Bandar Abbas, Iran, on August 5.Amirhosein Khorgooi/ISNA/AP
Trump has groused about oil prices recently after he came to office promising to lower them, but his war on Iran has driven them up.
He recently demanded that oil executives force prices down, at the same time noting his demand was far from capitalist.
“Based on a shortage, they’re making too much money. I don’t like it, and I should be the last one to say because I’m a big free enterprise guy — nobody bigger,” Trump said in the Oval Office earlier this month.
His own self-awareness about exceptions to support of free enterprise is something a lot of Americans can identify with.
Americans’ faith in capitalism is dropping
CNN’s Aaron Blake wrote last month about recent polling from Fox News that echoes Gallup data from last year. It suggests steady views of socialism, but significant drops in views of capitalism. In the Fox News poll, Americans are effectively split — 50% viewed capitalism favorably versus 46% who viewed it unfavorably.
He keys in on one particular data point: Only 41% of Republican registered voters have a strongly favorable view of capitalism in the most recent Fox News poll. Another 20% of Republicans registered voters expressed a somewhat favorable view of capitalism.
BLAKE: Just to underscore, fewer than half of Republicans — the party that claims to embrace free markets! — now have a strongly favorable view of capitalism. And 42% of them endorse a pretty Bernie Sanders-sounding sentiment about our “rigged” economy.
Selling access with a subscription model
A company that bears Trump’s name and owns his social media company is selling early access to his social media posts for up to $100,000 per month. Early access to the posts, which have moved markets when they announce tariffs or other policy decisions, give subscribers who can afford it — likely to be Wall Street firms and high frequency trading outfits — a leg up on a public who can’t afford access.
Family members technically control his business empire, but they have made no secret of the fact that they see the profit potential in his presidency, both for his businesses and their own.
Just one example: The Trump administration wants to spend a lot more money on defense and has asked Congress to approve $1.5 trillion for the Pentagon for the coming fiscal year, up from about $1 trillion in the current fiscal year. Two of his sons, coincidentally, invested in defense tech startups, as the Washington Post documented.
Whatever kind of economy it is becoming, it is far from the free market ideal people learn about in economics class.
While loudly stoking fear of communism, Trump is quietly changing US capitalism Egypt Independent.
Hence then, the article about while loudly stoking fear of communism trump is quietly changing us capitalism was published today ( ) and is available on EGYPT INDEPENDENT ( Egypt ) The editorial team at PressBee has edited and verified it, and it may have been modified, fully republished, or quoted. You can read and follow the updates of this news or article from its original source.
Read More Details
Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( While loudly stoking fear of communism, Trump is quietly changing US capitalism )
Also on site :
- 1988 Rock Song by Iconic Supergroup, Written Mainly by George Harrison, Is Still an Iconic Hit 38 Years Later
- Nocpix Nature lanza Rovex, una solución térmica de gran pantalla para una detección de aves más rápida
- Walmart’s ‘Perfect’ $45 Wrangler Purse Is ‘Fantastic Quality,’ and Available in 8 Fall-Friendly Colors