Is this the American oligarchy?

Summary

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Post Reports – "Is this the American oligarchy?"

Date: December 17, 2025
Host: Colby Ikowicz
Guest: Beth Reinhart, Investigative Political Reporter
Theme: A deep dive into the unprecedented influence of billionaires on American politics, especially in the wake of the second Trump administration, and the growing concerns that the U.S. is shifting toward an oligarchic system of power.

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Episode Overview

This episode investigates how an elite sliver of ultra-wealthy Americans—chiefly billionaires—are exerting massive and increasing influence over U.S. elections and governance. Reporter Beth Reinhart shares her findings, highlights how campaign finance reforms have eroded, and interrogates what the billionaire influx means for American democracy. The discussion centers on whether America is fast becoming an oligarchy, the mechanisms enabling this shift, the impact on policy and representation, and the growing public backlash.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Defining "Oligarch" in the American Context

• [00:33—02:19]

  • Beth Reinhart asks billionaire John Katsimatitis how he'd respond to being called an oligarch.
  • He insists American billionaires are fundamentally different from Russian-style oligarchs, attributing his wealth to hard work, not corruption.
    • Katsimatitis: “An oligarch is ... you make a deal with a crooked guy to become a crook ... A fellow crook.” (01:50)

• Insight:
  While U.S. billionaires may not see themselves as "oligarchs," their ascendant role in politics suggests a semantic shift is taking place, as their influence rivals that seen in countries typically labeled oligarchies.

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2. Billionaires’ Visible and Growing Political Power

• [03:16—05:57]

  • Reinhart describes the vivid visibility of billionaires at Trump’s second inauguration—an event symbolic of their proximity to direct power.
  • Seventeen billionaires, including Amazon's Jeff Bezos, Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg, Tesla/SpaceX's Elon Musk, Apple’s Tim Cook, and others, occupied VIP sections—sometimes ahead of governors and foreign dignitaries.
    • Reinhart: “It was amazing... how many billionaires they managed to squeeze into this very elite group... Never to this degree. Never this brazenly.” (04:57)

• Insight:
  The display wasn’t just about money—it signaled a normalization of billionaires’ centrality in American political life.

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3. Unprecedented Political Spending by the Ultra-Wealthy

• [06:35—08:22]

  • Reinhart and her team conducted a comprehensive analysis of campaign finance data.
  • Key Statistics:
    • Since 2000, spending by the 100 richest Americans has increased 140-fold.
    • In 2024, these 100 individuals contributed over $1 billion to elections: 7.5% of all federal election spending.
    • "One out of every thirteen dollars spent [in 2024] was donated by a handful of the wealthiest Americans." (07:58)

• Insight:
  Such outsized donations create a class whose financial influence rivals—if not exceeds—that of millions of voters.

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4. Which Party Do Billionaires Support?

• [08:33—09:09]

  • While both parties benefit, 80% of contributions from the top 100 wealthiest donors went to Republicans in 2024, especially Trump.
    • Ikowicz: “80%.”
    • Reinhart: “They’re surging toward Republicans and Trump.” (08:47)

• Insight:
  This is attributed to Trump’s promises of tax cuts, deregulation, and an overall friendlier environment toward big business and the ultra-wealthy.

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5. Why This Shift? Tech Billionaires & Business Favoritism

• [09:09—11:41]
  • Many billionaires are motivated by tax policy, deregulation, and frustration with being demonized by Democrats.
  • The tech industry, once comfortably Democratic, swung toward Republicans as they faced greater regulatory scrutiny under Biden.
    • Reinhart: “This is a group of very libertarian type thinkers, and they started really gravitating toward Trump and the Republican Party.” (11:17)

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6. The Power of Money in Determining Political Outcomes

• [12:01—14:31]

  • High-cost campaigns have created an “arms race” in spending; sophisticated data analysis tools for voter targeting are expensive.
  • Case Study:
    • In 2022, Peter Thiel’s $15M donation to Blake Masters transformed him from novice to Republican Senate primary frontrunner in Arizona.
      • Reinhart: “Money put him on the map... If you have access to a billionaire for funding, that can make a big difference.” (14:10)

• Counterpoint:

  • Money is powerful but not omnipotent; candidates like Zoran Mamdani in NYC bucked billionaire opposition and won. Similarly, Elon Musk’s $20M for a Wisconsin Supreme Court seat ultimately failed due to voter backlash.
    • Reinhart: “Even billionaires have their limits. They’re not gonna always win. But... overall, billionaires are doing very well. They have a seat at the table like never before.” (16:25)

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7. Campaign Finance: Regulatory Erosion and Super PACs

• [19:23—22:48]
  • Post-Watergate reforms sought to curb money’s influence, but Supreme Court decisions (most notably, 2010’s Citizens United) and the SpeechNow case effectively blew up spending limits for super PACs.
    • Reinhart: “After SpeechNow, they took away those limits... creating unlimited donations to PACs, which gave way to... ‘Super PACs’.”
  • Result: Candidates have grown progressively more reliant on ultra-wealthy donors for campaign funding.

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8. Direct Access and Influence: Billionaire Appointments & Policy Wins

• [23:24—26:25]
  • Trump filled his administration and cabinet with major billionaire donors, appointing figures like Howard Lutnick (Commerce Secretary) and Linda McMahon (Education Secretary).
    • Reinhart: "There’s several of them. Trump doesn’t try to paper over those relationships." (24:49)
  • The financial elite have achieved not merely “access” but direct control over key government levers, with policy wins such as extended tax cuts, deregulation, and weakened oversight agencies (IRS, CFPB) benefiting the wealthy.

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9. Pushback and Limitations

• [26:56—28:52]
  • Political and legal pushback exist but are limited in efficacy. Legislative efforts to tax the wealthy or clamp down on donor influence are largely stalled in a Republican-dominated Congress and White House.
  • Senator Bernie Sanders leads a vocal movement to “fight oligarchy,” rallying public support as a counterbalance:
    • Sanders: “People are sick and tired of a handful of billionaires running the United States government.” (28:20)

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10. The Future: More Billionaires, More Power?

• [28:52—30:49]

  • Reinhart predicts the trend will accelerate—with trillionaires (not just billionaires) possibly on the horizon, and growing dependence of politicians on this tiny class.
  • Striking Exchange:
    • Reinhart: “Do you think that there’s a small group of people with too much power?”
    • Katsimatitis: “Washington is for sale.” (29:57, 30:07)
    • Reinhart: “Are you allowed to say that?”
    • Katsimatitis: “I’m allowed to say that. Washington is for sale.” (30:05—30:11)

• Insight:
  The American ideal of “one person, one vote” is in tension with a reality where the rich can amplify their voice, potentially eclipsing ordinary voters.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “I grew up in Harlem and... worked 70, 80 hours a week for the last 50 years. I deserve it.”
  — John Katsimatitis (00:39)
• “We found that since 2000, spending by the 100 richest people has increased 140 fold.”
  — Beth Reinhart (06:51)
• “Money put him on the map... If you have access to a billionaire for funding, that can make a big difference.”
  — Beth Reinhart (14:10)
• “People are sick and tired of a handful of billionaires running the United States government.”
  — Bernie Sanders at a rally (28:20)
• “Washington is for sale.”
  — John Katsimatitis candidly (30:07)

---

Timestamps for Key Segments

• What Does It Mean to Be an Oligarch?: 00:33—02:19
• Billionaires at the Inauguration: 03:16—05:57
• Campaign Spending Data Deep Dive: 06:35—08:22
• Republican Surge in Billionaire Funding: 08:33—09:09
• Why Billionaires Back Trump: 09:09—11:41
• Impact of Money on Campaign Outcomes: 12:01—14:31
• Regulatory Changes/Citizens United: 19:23—22:48
• Billionaires in Cabinet & Policy Rewards: 23:24—26:25
• Backlash and Counterexamples: 14:31—16:25; 26:56—28:52
• Is Washington ‘For Sale’?: 29:57—30:15

---

Conclusion: American Democracy at a Crossroads

Beth Reinhart’s investigation reveals a seismic and escalating shift in American political power toward an ultra-elite class of billionaires—a trend marked by landmark campaign donations, direct access to the White House, visible and unapologetic influence, and corresponding policy rewards. While legal and democratic safeguards exist, they have thus far proven ineffective at checking billionaire power, raising existential concerns for the future of democratic representation and “one person, one vote.”

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For listeners interested in the full implications, this episode provides not just revealing numbers, but a nuanced portrait of how modern American politics is being reshaped—not behind closed doors, but increasingly in plain sight.

Transcript

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[Beth Reinhart]

What would you say if someone called you an oligarch? How would, how would you feel about that? Do you think?

[John Katsimatitis]

I grew up on the. I grew up in Harlem and, and I worked very hard. I worked seven days a week, 70 hours, 80 hours a week for the last 50 years. I deserve it.

[Colby Ikowicz]

This is Beth Reinhart, an investigative political reporter at the Post, speaking, speaking with John Katsimatitis. Katsimatitis is a billionaire who made his fortune in oil and real estate. And last year he donated $2.4 million to help elect Donald Trump and other Republicans. Bess asking him how he'd respond to someone calling him an oligarch because for months she's been reporting on how the ultra rich like him are donating record amounts to politics. Some, especially on the left, argue that it's moving American democracy closer to an oligarchy.

[Beth Reinhart]

We tend to think of oligarchy, tend to associate it with countries like Russia where you have, you know, a small group of very rich, corrupt politicians running the show. But I wanted to ask a billionaire, what is, what does he make of that?

[John Katsimatitis]

I want you to understand that it's different.

[Beth Reinhart]

He said he's proud of the wealth that he's earned.

[John Katsimatitis]

It isn't as if I made a deal with some crooked guy. An oligarch is. You make a deal with a crooked guy to become a crook in, how do you want to say it? A fellow crook. You follow me?

[Beth Reinhart]

And that he doesn't see any kind of a threat to democracy that's caused by him or other wealthy people.

[Colby Ikowicz]

But Beth and our colleagues found that billionaires do have an outsized sway over politics, that it's a very exclusive group of wealthy people who are donating growing amounts to influence U.S. elections.

[Beth Reinhart]

We're talking about 1-400th of 1% of the population that's having this much influence and spending this much money. It's a very, very small percentage of the population.

[Colby Ikowicz]

From the newsroom of the Washington Post, this is Post Reports. I'm Colby ekowicz. It's Wednesday, December 17th. Today, Beth takes us inside her reporting on the billionaires who are gaining more and more influence over US Politics, especially in the second Trump administration, and how that may be reshaping power in America. Beth, hi. I'm thrilled to have you on.

[Beth Reinhart]

Thanks so much. Great to be here.

[Colby Ikowicz]

When did it become obvious to you that something was changing, that the ultra wealthy were seeming to gain even more influence in politics than they previously had?

[Beth Reinhart]

I think there was a moment, not just for me, but for so many people that I talked to. They would say, remember that time at the inauguration, At Trump's second inauguration, below.

[Narrator/Reporter]

Freezing temperatures, moving the ceremony inside for.

[Beth Reinhart]

The first time in 40 years, a smaller guest list created for the smaller venue. There are about 800 seats that have been crammed into the rotunda for the vvips. We're talking about family members, Cabinet picks, Supreme Court members. When the three wealthiest people in the world, Jeff Bezos, who owns the Washington Post, Mark Zuckerberg, the meta guy, Elon Musk, the Tesla CEO, were all sitting right behind Trump's family and in front of some of the cabin, like, they had these, you know, VIP seats.

[Narrator/Reporter]

Please welcome the 47th President of the United States of America.

[Beth Reinhart]

And they weren't the only billionaires. We counted that at least 17 billionaires attended the inauguration. So Apple CEO Tim Cook was there, media mogul Rupert Murdoch. There were several others. Some of these names will be familiar to you. Vivek Ramaswamy, Howard Lutnick, Linda McMahon, Sam Altman, Sundar Pichai.

[Colby Ikowicz]

Wow.

[Beth Reinhart]

There were tens of thousands of people with tickets who didn't get to go. And in fact, there were governors and foreign dignitaries that had to stay in overflow areas. And it was amazing to us how many billionaires they managed to squeeze into this very elite group. And obviously there have been very wealthy people on the stage before, but never to this degree, never this brazenly, never this many. You know, we often think about, you know, the deals that are done in the, in the back rooms, right? A lot of deal making. A lot of wealthy people are doing business behind closed doors. But this was so striking that it was out in the open.

[Colby Ikowicz]

So, you know, these billionaires, they're out there more. We know that they donated to this inauguration to put the whole thing on. But did we have a sense then of just how much these billionaires had donated to Trump's campaign or to other political campaigns?

[Beth Reinhart]

I think we had some idea, I don't know that we knew the full extent. We knew that Elon Musk had spent this record setting amount, almost $300 million on Trump and other Republicans in both state and federal elections. Staggering amount of. And he was about to get basically the keys to the kingdom.

[Colby Ikowicz]

Right.

[Beth Reinhart]

He was about to become head of this new Department of Government Efficiency. And he was going to have, you know, pretty sweeping powers over personnel and policy. So we could all sense that we were in a different place, that these were extraordinary times, but we wanted to know more about what was going on behind the scenes.

[Colby Ikowicz]

And so you start looking into this, like, pretty soon after the inauguration, I think. Right. And what did you learn about how much money America's wealthiest are spending on politics?

[Beth Reinhart]

So this was a really heavy data lift. My colleague, data reporter ENS Moore, spent months and months poring through Federal Election Commission filings, FEC filings. That's where all federal campaign data is reported to the federal government. And also looking at data from Open Secrets and Transparency usa. This is not information that's easily accessible or in plain sight. Once we totaled up the numbers, it was a pretty surprising amount. We found that since 2000, spending by the 100 richest people has increased 140 fold since 2000, which is, you know, just skyrocketing amounts. We found that back in 2000, the country's wealthiest 100 people donated about a quarter of 1% of the total cost of federal elections. By 2024, it was 7.5%. Whoa. We're only talking about 100 people.

[Colby Ikowicz]

Remember that.

[Beth Reinhart]

This is like a handful of people that have this big share of the pie. Another way to look at it, in 2024, spending on elections by the richest 100Americans crossed the one billion dollar threshold. One out of every thirteen dollars spent in last year's election was donated by a handful of the wealthiest Americans.

[Colby Ikowicz]

Wow. Are both political parties benefiting from these, like, deep pocketed donors or one more than another?

[Beth Reinhart]

So both parties are definitely benefiting from the wealthy, but the wealthiest, if you look at the top 100, again, that group of people, 80% of their money went toward Republicans.

[Colby Ikowicz]

80%.

[Beth Reinhart]

So there's a real surge towards the Republican Party under Trump in 2024among the very, very wealthiest Americans. Again, that's not to say that Kamala Harris didn't get money from billionaires and millionair. In fact, I think she raised more money than Trump. But when you look at the most elite group, they're surging toward Republicans and Trump.

[Colby Ikowicz]

And were you able to uncover why that is? Is that about taxes and regulation? Why have they so strongly been backing Trump?

[Beth Reinhart]

I think there's a lot of reasons. I think Trump's agenda is definitely appealing to them. He campaigned on extending the tax cuts he signed into law during his first term. He also campaigned on radically changing the federal government. And that to many wealthy business people, the government is a real hindrance and a lot of red tape and bureaucracy and getting in their way and regulating them. In one interview I had with John Katsmataitis, the New York City billionaire we heard at the very top of the show, he said to me, billionaires want. If you're a billionaire, you want to stay a billionaire.

[Colby Ikowicz]

Hmm. As in, like, don't tax me.

[Beth Reinhart]

Not just don't tax me, but, you know, preserve my way of life, preserve my way of doing business. I also spoke with another billionaire named Thomas Petterfi. He founded an electronic brokerage firm. His net worth is like $57 billion. And he said business people are really drawn to Trump because of his promises to get rid of red tape and government bureaucracy. To the extent the wealthiest people are.

[John Katsimatitis]

Business people, they are surging towards Trump.

[Beth Reinhart]

Because they understand how much better Trump.

[John Katsimatitis]

Is for a prosperous economy.

[Beth Reinhart]

And we talked to other billionaires who talked about sort of the villainization, the demonization of the wealthiest Americans by Democrats and how that has become kind of a turnoff. And billionaires don't like that. They don't like being made to feel like they've done something wrong. They're, you know, reaping the profits that they have. They feel they've rightly earned.

[Colby Ikowicz]

You know, Beth, I've also been thinking about tech industries, because we talked about all the tech executives that were at Trump's inauguration. You know, there's been such an explosion of wealth in the tech industry in recent years. And, like, where they see themselves politically.

[Beth Reinhart]

Now, the tech industry had traditionally, Silicon Valley, had traditionally leaned Democratic, right? But that changed under Biden. They saw their industry becoming more policed, more negativity about big tech. And this is a group of very libertarian type thinkers, and they started really gravitating toward Trump and the Republican Party.

[Colby Ikowicz]

So, you know, through all of this work, you find this small group of billionaires have donated this enormous amount in the last federal election cycle. I mean, obviously, money matters in politics, but how much does this money actually matter or make a difference to who's going to win?

[Beth Reinhart]

So I think one of the biggest expenses is television. But increasingly, our campaigns have become so sophisticated in terms of the. The data analysis that they're using. You know, they're paying data scientists and other consultant types big sums of money to Figure out which voters they should be targeting and very specific ways how. And all of that's very expensive. And we've seen what is kind of like an arms race in the campaign world where things just keep getting more and more and more expensive.

[Colby Ikowicz]

Right. And so in order to keep up, you need more money.

[Beth Reinhart]

Right. And, you know, when. When one guy starts spending more money, then the other guy starts spending more money, too?

[Colby Ikowicz]

I mean, is there an example of a campaign that maybe was going in one direction and then suddenly there was this infusion of funds and that changed the trajectory of the race?

[Beth Reinhart]

One example of that is if you look at the 2022 Senate race in Arizona, you had a fairly crowded Republican primary. You had the sitting attorney general. You. You had a millionaire who was self financing his campaign. Those were among the candidates. Then you had this guy, Blake Masters. He was a political novice. He had never run before, but he had worked and was friends with Peter Thiel, a billionaire investor. And so even though he might have been seen as a long shot, when Peter Thiel put $15 million into a super PAC benefiting Blake Masters, Blake Masters quickly became the front runner.

[Colby Ikowicz]

But it's decisive at this point.

[Narrator/Reporter]

We did it.

[Beth Reinhart]

And the seal of approval from Peter Thiel, I think, you know, that that sends a message to other wealthy people, sends a message to President Trump about who was sort of the anointed person. And Blake Masters, despite being a very flawed candidate, won the nomination and then, of course, went on to lose in the general election to incumbent Democrat Mark Kelly.

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But.

[Colby Ikowicz]

Right, Beth, he didn't ultimately win.

[Beth Reinhart]

Right? He didn't, but it was his path to the Republican nomination. Money put him on the map. Obviously, there's a lot of reasons why campaigns go up and down, but with campaigns costing as much as they do, increasingly, if you have access to a billionaire for funding, that can make a big difference.

[Colby Ikowicz]

That's so interesting. So, I mean, I think about this and I think about the influence of these very wealthy people, but then I think that there's also a backlash to that. Right. And you look at someone like Zoran Mamdani, who won the mayor's race in New York City, and he was able to kind of buck the billionaire class and win. So I wonder how that fits into this narrative.

[Beth Reinhart]

You're right. He was someone who had been very critical of billionaires.

[Narrator/Reporter]

I don't think that we should have billionaires because, frankly, it is so much money in a moment of such inequality. And ultimately, what we need more of is equality across our city and across our state and across our country.

[Beth Reinhart]

And I look forward the billionaire class, they banded together and set out to stop him and he came up winning. So I think it tells you that, you know, even billionaires have their limits. They're not gonna always win. Money doesn't always make the difference. Another example of billionaires not winning we earlier this year when Elon Musk put $20 million toward a Supreme Court seat in Wisconsin.

[Colby Ikowicz]

That's right.

[Beth Reinhart]

It's not the most important political contest in human history, but it is now the most expensive race ever for a seat on the state Supreme Court of Wisconsin. That seemed to sort of backfire. People protested and didn't like one man spending that much money on a seat for the Supreme Court. And he lost. But if you set aside these examples of when billionaires have come up short and you look at the big picture, overall billionaires are doing very well. They have a seat at the table like never before, they're spending more money than ever before, and they have more influence than ever before.

[Colby Ikowicz]

After the break, we look at how we got to this point and how the recent campaign donations might be paying off already. We'll be right back.

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[Colby Ikowicz]

How did we get to a point where the wealthiest Americans can exert this much power over our elections and then over our elected officials? Like we talked about earlier, money in politics, not new. And yet now we're talking about a billion dollars spent in the last presidential election. Like what happened?

[Beth Reinhart]

So to understand how we got here, you go back to Watergate. Of course. You know, maybe the most infamous campaign finance scandal From President Nixon's 1972 campaign, which led to his impeachment and resignation.

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[Beth Reinhart]

After Watergate, Congress came in with a number of reforms. They limited contributions, they limited spending, and they created the Federal Election Commission to regulate federal elections. These regulations are pretty Byzantine, but the goal is to curb corruption and increase transparency so that campaign spending and fundraising is all reported and publicly available.

[Colby Ikowicz]

So then there's been so many changes since then, right? I mean, those rules and regulatory structures have just continued to erode.

[Beth Reinhart]

Right. In 2010, you saw basically an earthquake in terms of campaign finance. Citizens United ruling, which many people I think might be familiar with, really changed the landscape, clearing the way for corporations and unions to contribute unlimited money to elections.

[Narrator/Reporter]

This is an extraordinarily triumphant day for the First Amendment. Let there be no mistake. Today's decision is the most radical and destructive campaign finance decision in the history of the United States Supreme Court.

[Beth Reinhart]

And then right after that, there was a federal court ruling. Didn't reach the Supreme Court, but it had a very big impact. That ruling was called SpeechNow. And before speech now, there were limits on how much donors could contribute to PACs. It was a $5,000 limit.

[Colby Ikowicz]

PACs being political action committees.

[Sponsor Advertiser]

Right.

[Beth Reinhart]

And after SpeechNow, they took away those limits. So basically creating unlimited donations to PACs, which gave way to the name Super PAC, meaning a political committee on steroids, essentially, that people can give unlimited contributions to. The legal theory was that donors should be able to give whatever they want to a political committee because it's basically equivalent to free speech. We shouldn't restrain their speech. We shouldn't restrain how much money they give to a political action committee. And after that, we saw really an explosion in the number of super PACs. It's just been every election cycle, more and more super PACs, and them playing even a more and more dominant role in campaigns. And as a result, candidates are increasingly reliant on wealthy donors to fuel those super PACs.

[Colby Ikowicz]

So now that we've covered all of that, how we got to a point that mega donors can play a bigger role in campaigns. I want to get back to these donations that you've uncovered over the past year, because you mentioned that, you know, access to the White House is. Is probably what billionaires are seeking when they're donating to campaigns. So have they achieved that? Like, what does that access looked like now that Trump is president? I mean, when I think about mega donors, I often think about, like, these cushy ambassador jobs in these fantastic European cities. I mean, is that a thing that people still get?

[Beth Reinhart]

Ambassadorships are still a prize often given to wealthy donors, but we've seen billionaires be more involved in the White House than we have before. I mean, Elon Musk running Doge. There were a record number of billionaires appointed by President Trump to his administration. We counted about a dozen, and there are a couple in his cabinet. His Commerce secretary, Howard Lutnick. He and his wife gave hundreds of thousands of dollars to Trump and pro Trump groups in 2020. And then in 2024, he gave nearly $9 million. Trump named him a co chair of the transition in between the campaign and the administration. Linda McMahon, the education secretary, she and her husband have given more than $47 million to Trump and other pro Trump groups and the RNC since 2015. So that's a level of involvement that we haven't seen before.

[Colby Ikowicz]

And so you're saying that that's rare or even unprecedented that a president would take one of their largest, a large donor, and make them a cabinet official?

[Beth Reinhart]

I wouldn't say that's unprecedented that someone who is a donor gets a plum job. Again, it's to the extent the number of billionaires, there's not just one or two, you know.

[John Katsimatitis]

Right.

[Beth Reinhart]

There's several of them. Trump doesn't try to paper over those relationships.

[Colby Ikowicz]

Okay, Beth, so we've talked about these appointments of some of these billionaires to cabinet positions. But since Trump took office again, how else have the billionaires or the billionaire class reaped the benefits of supporting him?

[Beth Reinhart]

To be clear, Trump wasn't the first president to court wealthy donors and to support policies that favor the rich. Democratic President Bill Clinton aggressively courted Wall Street. Then he signed a sweeping financial deregulation bill and a trade deal that was strongly backed by wealthy Americans. Republican President George W. Bush also relied heavily on affluent donors. He pushed through tax cuts that benefited the rich and bailed out big banks. But Trump, I think to a singular extent, his agenda has really benefited the wealthy in very striking ways. Much of Trump's agenda, not all of it, but much of his agenda has benefited the wealthiest Americans. There was a huge tax cut for wealthy Americans and corporations, or the extension of those cuts, while at the same time slashing health care for the poor and the elderly. We've seen a radical restructuring of the federal government, downsizing of agencies that got in the way of corporate activities. Other examples, the irs, for example, under President Biden had they had expanded its efforts at cracking down on the wealthiest tax cheats. The IRS under Trump has gotten a lot smaller. We're seeing the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which was started to protect consumers from predatory financial institutions, is on its deathbed. So we're seeing in a lot of policy areas, policies that benefit the very wealthy.

[Colby Ikowicz]

Beth, I know there's been pushback to how much billionaires have influenced our Politics. We talked about Mom Dani running on this platform. But are there any actual efforts, any actual legislation underway to really push back against the growing influence of billionaires?

[Beth Reinhart]

Courts have been very reluctant to step in here. They have tended, if anything, to loosen campaign finance regulations as opposed to restricting how much people can give. There are Democrats who have proposed legislation that would raise taxes on the wealthy, that would tax not just income, but wealth, which is really where billionaires have money. It's not their annual salary. But those efforts are not gaining steam, especially with a Republican controlled Congress and White House. But probably the most well known person speaking out against billionaires right now is Senator Bernie Sanders, the independent from Vermont.

[Narrator/Reporter]

And what we are hearing loudly and clearly is the American people say no to oligarchy.

[Beth Reinhart]

You did see in this past year Sanders out there leading these fighting oligarchy tours that drew hundreds of thousands of people.

[Narrator/Reporter]

People are sick and tired of a handful of billionaires running the United States government.

[Beth Reinhart]

So at these rallies, Bernie Sanders is trying to galvanize the ordinary American, the average person, and say, you know, you have a voice. You shouldn't let billionaires drown out your voice just because they have all the money. It's really a call to action and a movement that he is trying to lead.

[Colby Ikowicz]

Okay, so there's pushback from people like Bernie Sanders, but where does this moment, where does it go from here? Because, you know, there's more billionaires than ever. Do you think there's just gonna continue to be this acceleration of influence of billionaires in our politics?

[Beth Reinhart]

I think so. And in fact, we're probably gonna see trillionaires in the next decade. If you think about 1/400th of 1% of Americans, that's the billionaire class weighing this heavily on elections, having this much influence and the cost of elections rising. You have politicians more dependent on a billionaire class than ever before. And that has, you know, very broad implications for policy. When I talked to John Katsimatidis, that New York City billionaire, we talked about this question about the billionaire class and what are the implications for democracy? But do you think that there's a small group of people with too much power? And it's.

[John Katsimatitis]

You know, it depends if they're smart enough to know how to use their money. Washington is for sale.

[Beth Reinhart]

Are you allowed to say that?

[John Katsimatitis]

I'm allowed to say that Washington is for sale.

[Beth Reinhart]

What does that mean?

[John Katsimatitis]

That means both sides and people are.

[Beth Reinhart]

Seeing that as a threat to democracy, to the ideal of one person, one vote. If billionaires, who are such a small percent of the population are being heard or their voices are louder because they're able to spend so much more money than the average person, basically unlimited money. And you know, when you look at the net worth of these billionaires, they're spending $100 million, $200 million. That's pocket change for them.

[Colby Ikowicz]

Well, Beth, thank you so much for coming on.

[Beth Reinhart]

Thank you.

[Colby Ikowicz]

Beth Reinhart is a political investigative reporter for the Post. That's it for Post Reports. Thanks for listening. We are so grateful to have you as a listener. And now we want to learn more about your listening habits and how you think we can be better. We've got a new survey that we're running for a limited time, and we would love to hear from you. It shouldn't take more than 10 minutes to complete. To do that, you go to washingtonpost.com podcastsurvey again, that is washingtonpost.com podcastsurveY when you're done, you can enter to win $100 gift card. And one more time if that got your attention. That is washingtonpost.com podcastsurvey Today's show was produced by Rennie Sveranofsky and mixed by Shawn Carter. It was edited by Ilana Gordon. Thanks to editor Patrick Caldwell. I'm Colby Ikowicz. We'll be back tomorrow with more stories from the Washington Post.

[Washington Post Promoter]

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