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Defund Oligarchy
Trump ran on a promise to “drain the swamp” — one year after his inauguration, he has done the exact opposite. Instead of making life affordable for everyday Americans, Trump has enriched himself and his oligarch cronies by privatizing the government and plundering taxpayer dollars.
While families struggle with rising costs, Trump has turned the presidency into his personal ATM, funneling public money, political favors, and government resources into the pockets of his donors, cronies, and his own family businesses. His oligarch allies — from Big Tech CEOs to Big Oil barons — are already seeing massive returns on their political investments, while working people are left holding the bill.
It’s time we Defund the Oligarchs — and Fund the People.
Trump & the Oligarchy Video Series
Trump & the Oligarchy:
First Annual Return on Investment Report
Candidate Trump ran on a promise to “drain the swamp” and fight for working people but as President he has done the exact opposite. In the first year of his second term Trump has presided over the biggest steal in American history.
Trump's 2024 election campaign was overwhelmingly funded by a small group of billionaire oligarchs in industries whose bottom line depends directly on presidential support – fossil fuels, immigrant expulsion, crypto, and artificial intelligence. These oligarchs invested heavily in getting Trump elected, and as this series of reports shows, the returns they have seen on their investments in just the first year of his administration have been nothing short of stunning.
Trump’s top donors in crypto, oil & gas, and deportation spent $700 million supporting his campaign and the MAGA movement, and in exchange got $172.5 billion — almost an 18,000% return on investment. In other words, on average, for every $1 million these industry oligarchs donated, they got $18 billion back. Big Tech oligarchs got an even bigger payoff. The top tech CEOs paid Trump $72 million over the last year and saw their fortunes balloon by $494 billion — a 686,011% return on investment. Trump’s own family grew their wealth by $5 billion in his first year back in office. For Trump's oligarch backers in the media industry, the return on investment was not immediate monetary gain, but long-term power and influence.
Oil & Gas Oligarchs
Trump’s old friends in the oil and gas industry led the way. In 2024 they ponied up $443 million to put Trump in the Presidency and Republicans in Congress. In return they got $153 billion in tax breaks, plus the evisceration of efforts to slow climate change and build renewable energy. That’s a 33,443% return on their investment — even without counting other handouts to the industry handouts like federal drilling leases and regulatory rollbacks.
Deportation Oligarchs
Another traditional Trump ally are the private contractors who enable the detention and deportation of immigrants. The big three contractors, GEO Group, CoreCivic, and CSI Aviation, donated almost $5 million in 2024 to elect a president who had promised to massively increase immigrant expulsions. Their bet paid off, Trump’s 2025 budget bill aimed to quadruple expulsions and could mean over $5 billion in revenue and $500 million in profits for these contractors alone – an 11,050% return on investment. Meanwhile, Palantir, the data harvesting and analysis company founded by far-right billionaire Peter Thiel, stands to make millions more in contracts to expand the federal government’s surveillance capabilities over immigrants – and everyone else.
Crypto Oligarchs
The crypto industry is a more recent convert to the MAGA cause. Traditionally liberal leaning, the crypto bros turned to Trump in reaction to Biden administration efforts to rein in the industry following the collapse of the FTX crypto exchange in 2023. The industry massively ramped up its political spending in the 2024 election campaign, with $40 million going to Trump’s campaign and inauguration. The nine biggest crypto donors, including Brian Armstrong, Marc Andreesen, and future commerce secretary, Howard Lutnick, together spent $212 million on the election and saw their wealth surge post-election by $19 billion, as Trump ended enforcement efforts and enacted policies to make the America the “crypto capital of the planet.” An 8,862% return on investment.
Big Tech & AI Oligarchs
The big tech and artificial intelligence oligarchs also bet late, but heavily, on Trump 2.0. Jeff Bezos, Sam Altman, Mark Zuckerberg, Sergei Brin and Larry Page of Google, and Jensen Huang of Nvidia, many of whom had been vocal Trump critics, all donated to his inauguration and appeared there as VIP guests. Their companies are all making huge investments in AI infrastructure, including energy-guzzling data centers, and need Trump to make these investments pay off. So far, their bets have paid off handsomely. As Trump promotes the breakneck development of AI regardless of social or economic costs, the market cap of Big AI firms – and these oligarchs’ stakes in them, has massively expanded. Collectively, the AI Oligarchs invested $72 million in supporting Trump. In return, their net worth is up over the last year by $494 billion. That’s a 686,011% ROI.
Media Oligarchs
The American media landscape was already dominated by oligarchs before Trump’s rise to power. Since then, with Trump’s blessing, MAGA allies including Musk and Larry Ellision have extended their control over major streaming platforms and broadcasting outlets and silenced dissenting voices like Colbert. Meanwhile, other media corporations have lent Trump financial support or taken actions aligned with his agenda, while the Trump-appointed Federal Communications Commission threatens legal action to keep them in line.
Trump Family
Finally, in terms of percentage wealth increase, Trump and his family have made out even better than their oligarch backers. Since he won the GOP nomination in early 2025, his net worth has almost tripled from $2.3 to $6.7 billion. Most of this gain comes from the various crypto businesses Trump and his sons have launched rather than his flagging real estate empire, but in both lines of business the Trumps have profited by offering access and influence to the rich and powerful, including businesses connected to foreign governments. In the most notorious of these deals, Trump greenlighted the transfer of the most advanced AI chips to the United Arab Emirates, two weeks after a UAE-linked investment fund bought $2 billion in Trump-issued crypto tokens.
This is information the American public needs in order to understand the scale of the grift that the Trump administration is engaged in as it enriches industry oligarchs at the expense of the average American, while scapegoating immigrants and the most vulnerable. Our tax dollars shouldn’t be funneled into the pockets of people like Bezos and Musk, but rather invested in Americans in terms of healthcare, education, and good jobs. Which side is the government on? Right now, it's clearly on the side of self-enrichment and growing the wealth of the wealthiest oligarchs.
The Resolution:
Defund the Oligarchs. Fund the People.
Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib, alongside Reps. Pramila Jayapal, Delia Ramirez, and Summer Lee, and our team here at Our Revolution, have introduced a resolution demanding Congress end billionaire subsidies, public contracts, tax giveaways, and pay-to-play corruption — and instead invest in housing, healthcare, education, and working families.
Congress must end the subsidies, public contracts, tax giveaways and pay-to-play schemes that support the billionaire class, and invest in housing, healthcare, education, and more for the working class.
As billionaire wealth explodes and the cost of living crushes everyday people, Trump and his ultra-wealthy donors are cashing in on rigged rules and government handouts. This resolution draws a clear line: no more oligarchy, no more corruption, no more billionaire rule.
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