Former White House Communications Director during President Donald Trump’s first term in office, Anthony Scaramucci, has endorsed a Fortune Magazine column warning that Trump and the MAGA movement were increasingly “going Marxist and Maoist.”
The Greater Assault On “Free-Market Capitalism”
On Tuesday, Scaramucci posted on X, sharing the column titled, “Is MAGA going Marxist and Maoist? Trump’s assault on free-market capitalism,” along with its link.
See Also: Trump Wanted Intel CEO Out, Now Lip-Bu Tan Is Heading To The White House On Monday: Report
The column, written by Yale School of Management senior associate dean Jeffrey Sonnenfeld and co-author Steven Tian, alongside three other co-authors, argues that while some CEOs are worried about progressive policies in New York City under Mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani, there is a “greater assault on free-market capitalism” elsewhere.
They say that Trump’s approach to business intervention is unprecedented among leaders of free-market economies, citing examples such as Coca-Cola being ordered to replace cane sugar with other sweeteners the company currently uses, alongside the public humiliation of CEOs such as Tim Cook of Apple and Jamie Dimon of JPMorgan, among others.
This, the authors warn, poses “far more dangerous” risks to capitalism “than a city-run grocery store,” a reference to one of Mamdani’s policy proposals.
The column concludes by saying that “Adam Smith's salute to the ‘invisible hand' of free markets in favor of the fist of government appears to be losing out in the Trump administration,” adding that this administration now has more in common with Karl Marx and Mao Zedong, than it does with Ayn Rand or Adam Smith.
A Mafia Boss “Running A Protection Racket”
Economist Craig Shapiro often compares Trump to a mafia boss. Recently, he highlighted the fact that Trump wasn’t fighting inflation using traditional monetary and fiscal tools, but was instead “managing it like a boss running a protection racket.”
Here, Shapiro is referring to the public shaming, backroom pressure tactics, and regulatory threats that Trump uses to influence corporate pricing behaviors, citing examples such as his “eat the tariffs” remark to Walmart, which was essentially a warning to the retailer not to increase prices in response to the tariffs.
The U.S. Federal Government has also been making significant investments under the Trump Administration, such as the Department of Defense acquiring a $400 million stake in rare earths miner MP Materials.
This marks a significant shift in the Republican Party, which has long championed free-market capitalism, towards state intervention and state-backed capitalism like China.
Photo Courtesy: Al Teich On Shutterstock.com
Read More:
