Trump's inauguration: government of the rich, by the rich, for the rich

The political fraud that is right-wing populism was on full display at Donald Trump's inauguration: it's the plutocrats who stand to rule

Donald Trump: man of the people, courageous fighter against the elites. That’s his presentation, of course, and pesky facts like him being a billionaire, and the son of a millionaire, hasn’t managed to sink that narrative.

Today was his inauguration, and attending with pride of place the richest men on earth. Not just the richest men on earth now, but the richest men in the history of our species. Elon Musk, worth $434 billion. Jeff Bezos, worth nearly $240 billion. Mark Zuckerberg, worth $212 billion. Sundar Pichai, the Google CEO, is only just a billionaire, so he was the relative pauper on show.

There was also Miriam Adelson, an Israeli-American who donated $100 million to Donald Trump’s campaign, described by Itay Epshtain, an Israeli expert in international humanitarian law as follows:

“Widow of gambling profiteer Sheldon Adelson - a key donor to the Trump campaign and rabid supporter of #Israel's annexation of occupied #Palestinian territory and the subjugation of Palestinians. Very little else needs to be said.”

Their presence matters, because it’s these billionaires Trump will fight for. They expose what so-called ‘right-wing populism’ is about - pretending to fight for the little guy, but instead standing for plutocrats who want to crush the little guy.

It’s a US rigged in favour of plutocrats like this which has plunged the country into crisis, not the targets favoured by Donald Trump and his allies. He talked in his inauguration of a “radical and corrupt establishment” - but those are exactly the plutocrats seated behind him.

Indeed, as journalist Lee Fang put it:

“Over the next decade Silicon Valley will replace blue and white collar workers w/ AI and outsource more jobs overseas. Truckers, designers, engineers, lawyers, and far more. Power will flow to the dozen tech overlords standing next to Trump at his inauguration. Ominous optics.”

In his final address, Joe Biden warned “an oligarchy is taking shape in America of extreme wealth, power and influence that really threatens our entire democracy, our basic rights and freedom.”

Well, a bit late for all that from Genocide Joe, denouncing the dangerous concentration of power in the hands of a very few ultra wealthy people. What did he, Obama and the Democrats do about it when they had the chance? Congress is dominated by millionaires, with wealth far beyond the reach of most Americans. Corporate money dominates politics, including in the Democratic Party. The world’s richest 500 people, dominated by Americans, ended 2024 with a combined nearly $10 trillion. Meanwhile wages, have stagnated for many millions of Americans, driving political disillusionment that alas Trump and his ilk have exploited.

Now Trump’s big target, of course, was migrants, or million of “criminal aliens”, as he put it. No evidence is provided for his claim of large numbers of these migrants being '“dangerous criminals, many from prisons and mental institutions.”

Now the actual research finds that increases in immigration don’t cause a drop in wages for US-born workers, or take their jobs. The presence of migrants boosts economic activity as well as productivity which drives up wages. It’s the US elite, on the other hand, who attack already decimated labor unions, who send Americans jobs overseas, and drive economic crises with their greed, such as the 2008 financial crash.

Trump talks of being a peacemaker, but wants to go to war with Panama with baseless claims that the Panama Canal is being operated by China, and that this is going to be taken by the US. He also declared he’d rename the Gulf of Mexico the Gulf of America. He should ask his pal Elon Musk how successful the effort to rename Twitter ‘X’ has gone as a precedet.

As dark as his inauguration speech was, his subsequent speech to supporters was darker still, largely attacking various foes of his, like Nancy Pelosi, and defending what he describes as the “January 6th hostages”, that is, those who took part in the insurrection which attempted to overturn the election results back in 2021.

Well, it should be noted who is particularly happy - and that’s the far right. That is the literal inarguable far right. The far right militia, the Proud Boys, marched through Washington DC.

So what happens next? Trump will drive policies which will favour the wealthy plutocrats standing by him at his inauguration. He will try and win over those who are struggling not with actual answers to their material problems, but by redirecting all the anger at migrants and other powerless groups of people, like trans people, who he also gunned for.

The Democrats will undoubtedly roll over. Well, the answer of course is to build movements based on economic justice, which hammer an administration which is of the rich, for the rich and by the rich. The problem of course is American democracy is imperilled, and the new vengeful more extreme Trump will do all he can to smash such movements. It’s going to take a lot of guts, determination and creativity.

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