By JOHN KIRKLAND, Workers Voice USA
Donald Trump was sworn in on Monday, Jan. 20 (Martin Luther King Day), in a ceremony attended by Washington’s elite, a contingent of tech oligarchs—including Bezos, Zuckerberg, and Musk—and former presidents. In his inaugural address, Trump proclaimed that “the Golden Age of America begins right now. From this day forward, our country will flourish and be respected again all over the world.”
Referencing the assassination attempt against him in Pennsylvania, Trump professed that he had been “saved by God to Make America Great Again” and proclaimed Jan. 20, 2025, as “Liberation Day.”
Trump gave a prepared address that seemed slightly more coherent than most of his campaign speeches. The address reiterated a variety of points from his campaign that are designed to pull in and solidify the disparate components of the MAGA coalition.
For the billionaires and other capitalists who have joined the MAGA camp, Trump promised to eviscerate business and environmental regulations while lowering corporate taxes. Federal departments and social programs would be made much leaner, while money would continue to flow to military, space, oil and mining, and tech industries. A beefed-up military is portrayed as a method to “keep the peace” and wrangle foreign concessions, perhaps with some saber-rattling in places like Panama. In the meantime, any protests would be mitigated and law and order would be maintained.
Trump promised to gut the so-called “deep state” and has appointed a “Department of Government Efficiency” (DOGE), a presidential advisory commission led by billionaire Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy. Musk, who spent $277 million to elect Trump, is expected to play an outsized role in the administration. In the period following the election, the tech oligarchy has moved more firmly into the Trump camp. Musk was joined in his support for Trump by Jeff Bezos (Amazon/Washington Post), Mark Zuckerberg (META), and APPLE CEO Tim Cook, who donated $1 million to Trump’s inaugural committee.
The tech oligarchs are joined by PayPal CEO Peter Thiel, who has been a longtime advocate for rightist and libertarian ideas. Theil is a patron of the incoming Vice President JD Vance. Zuckerberg, in a concession to Trump, has promised to ease or eliminate fact checking on Facebook. The Washington Post killed a cartoon by satirist Ann Telnaes depicting the tech billionaires prostrating themselves before Trump. Telnaes subsequently resigned.
For less well-heeled citizens, including disoriented middle-class and some working-class people who voted for him, Trump offered a hollow pledge to wipe out the “radical and corrupt establishment” that “has extracted power and wealth from our citizens.” At the same time, as he has done in his campaign talks, he attempted to shift the blame for the country’s economic and social problems away from the wealthy “establishment” and onto the backs of scapegoats. As a remedy, he promised measures that would increase the dangers faced by immigrants, facilitate discrimination against trans people, and place the entire world in additional peril from climate change.
Trump has promised a lot to his base, but it is unlikely that he will be able to deliver. Many of the problems we face are rooted in the multiple crises of the capitalist system itself. Capitalism faces interlocking economic, climate, and political challenges that are not solvable in the interests of working-class people without taking action against the very system that drives them.
Trump’s political ideas are contradictory. His rhetoric plays to the far right, but the team he has constructed is not reflective of a unified programmatic orientation. His cabinet appointments include more traditional neocon interventionists despite Trump’s rhetorical isolationism. Additionally, his nominee for Secretary of Defense is a Christian white nationalist. As we have noted before, Trump does not have a consistent political worldview. What matters to Trump is what serves his purposes in power, and in the moment. In this sense, he can be unpredictable and dangerous.
Immigration: mass deportations
Trump has signed a huge series of executive orders in his short time in the White House. These include declaring “a national emergency at our southern border” and promising to return “millions and millions of criminal aliens back to the places from which they came.” He promised to return to a “remain in Mexico” policy and a halt to the so-called “catch and release” program of the Biden administration. He attacked immigrants who lack legal documents as “dangerous criminals, many from prisons and mental institutions.” He said he would send troops to the southern border to stop the “invasion of our country.”
Trump affirmed that the system of mass deportation would be put in place almost immediately. His new administration has set in motion the possibility of opening churches, hospitals, and schools to raids by federal officials. Trump and his team have threatened the deportation of millions of men, women, and children, although the administration has refused to cite concrete numbers. There are an estimated 11 million to 15 million undocumented workers in the country, mainly centered in agriculture, construction, and the food service and hospitality sector. Mass deportation of workers from these sectors, especially in the context of a labor shortage, will be damaging to the economy.
During the campaign Trump vilified migrants and asylum seekers, accusing immigrants from Latin America of being criminals, rapists, and murderers. He made the astounding and false claim that Haitian immigrants eat the family pets of neighbors, a racist slander similar to those made in the 1970s and ’80s about Vietnamese immigrants accused of eating dogs and cats.
The House of Representatives recently passed the Laken Riley Act, which requires putative detention measures against immigrant workers accused of certain crimes. The bill was passed with bipartisan support from some Democrats. The Senate version of the bill was amended to require detention for immigrants accused of assaulting a police officer. This amendment was passed with broad bipartisan support. The government is expected to build mass internment camps for the detention of immigrants. Trump also declared that he would be designating drug cartels as “foreign terrorist organizations.” He said he would use the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 to use “federal and state law enforcement” to eliminate “foreign” gangs in the U.S.
Immigration represents one possible fissure in Trump’s coalition of billionaires and the far right. While the far right is salivating for a robust program of deportation, representing a sort of ethnic cleansing program, the fiscal cost of such a program may be prohibitive. Also, it’s clear that broad sectors of U.S. society do not support such an inhumane and reactionary program. Through the construction of broad, mass opposition, workers and the oppressed can put a stop to this policy.
In December, the immigration debate blew up inside the Trump camp with far-right activists attacking Elon Musk on the issue of H-1B visas, a mechanism through which tech companies employ lower-paid IT workers. The controversy erupted when MAGA influencer Laura Loomer attacked Trump appointee Sriram Krishnan, who Trump tapped to advise him on issues related to artificial intelligence. Krisnan is an advocate for immigration through H-1B visas. Elon Musk replied to critics by posting on X, “The reason I’m in America along with so many critical people who built SpaceX, Tesla and hundreds of other companies that made America strong is because of H1B. Take a big step back and F*** YOURSELF in the face. I will go to war on this issue the likes of which you cannot possibly comprehend.”
Additionally, Musk has claimed that there is a shortage of qualified U.S.-born tech workers in contradiction to claims made by Loomer and others on the right that U.S. citizens are displaced by workers from overseas. Musk posted on X that, “”There is a dire shortage of extremely talented and motivated engineers in America…If you force the world’s best talent to play for the other side, America will LOSE.” According to CBS News, “…labor market data suggests that American tech workers aren’t in short supply, and critics of the H-1B program say it displaces Americans in favor of foreign-born employees hired at lower salaries.”
CBS continued writing, “Tech companies have also laid off hundreds of employees in recent years while continuing to sponsor new H-1B visas. An analysis by the Economic Policy Institute found that the top 30 companies hiring the most H-1B workers hired 34,000 new H-1B employees in 2022 but laid off at least 85,000 workers that year and in early 2023.” Trump has weighed in on Musk’s side in this debate, sparking a reaction from Steve Bannon who accused Musk of trying to build “techno-feudalism on a global scale.” Bannon also called for the deportation of H-1B holders on a mass scale and termed the program a :”total scam” that allows the tech sector to exploit cheaper labor.
A Workers Voice article, Trump and right-wing allies wrangle over H-1B immigrant program states, “H-1Bs have been a godsend for the tech industry for two reasons. One is that it has allowed the industry to expand at a rate faster than the U.S. economy can add new domestic technology workers. Secondly, it has created a vast underclass of tech workers who are exploited at a higher rate than citizens and permanent residents, since they are often tied to a single job and switching jobs while keeping an H1-B is much more difficult.”
Defending the working class means fighting for immigrants’ rights and against the artificial divisions imposed upon the world by the capitalists. We are against all deportations, and for guaranteeing full civil rights to immigrant workers, including the right to change jobs, to quit their job, to unionize, to vote, and to have easy access to citizenship.
Tariffs and China
Trump said he would direct his cabinet to “defeat record inflation and rapidly bring down costs.” In blatant contradiction to this boast, however, was his pledge to place high tariffs on goods from other countries. This is a centerpiece of his program despite the warnings by many economists that such measures would likely raise inflation, since the cost of tariffs are generally passed on to consumers.
During the campaign, Trump raised the possibility of 60% tariffs on China and additional high tariffs on countries like Mexico and Canada. In one of his first executive orders on taking office, Trump seemed to back away from the immediate imposition of tariffs. According to the New York Times, “The executive order will direct federal agencies to examine unfair trade and currency practices and to assess whether foreign governments have complied with terms of the two trade deals Mr. Trump signed in his first presidency. It will also require the government to assess the feasibility of creating an ‘External Revenue Service. to collect tariffs and duties.”
Another possible approach by the administration would be to impose restrictions on investment in key Chinese industries and high-tech exports to China. Stopping China’s development of artificial intelligence technology has been a key policy of the Biden administration and will likely continue under Trump. In his final days in office, Biden placed new export controls on China that restrict supplies of the advanced computer chips used to develop AI.
U.S. China policy in recent years is defined by the inter-imperialist competition between the U.S., which is still the strongest imperialist power and a rising competitor, China. China is competing directly with the U.S. for resources, markets, and geopolitical advantage in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. The point of Obama’s “pivot to Asia” and Biden’s economic policies has been to prepare the U.S. to compete with China on a world scale.
One of Trump’s executive orders delays the enforcement of the ban on TikTok for 75 days. The recent law is trying to force the sale of the platform to a U.S. owner. Trump had originally called for a ban on the platform because of its supposed control by the “Chinese Communist Party.” There is no small irony in the fact that TikTok users are now flocking to RedNote (Xiaohongshu), an app named after Mao’s “Little Red Book” of quotations.
Trump erroneously claimed in his speech that China controls the Panama Canal and said that his administration would return the canal to U.S. control. He has refused to rule out the use of military force to gain control of the Canal, as well as Greenland.
A flurry of executive orders
The first executive order (EO) that Trump signed on Jan. 20 was a full pardon for 1500 Jan. 6, 2021, rioters. He also commuted the sentences of more than a dozen members of the far-right Oath Keepers—including their leader, Stewart Rhodes. Enrique Tarrio, the former head of the Proud Boys, who was serving 22 years in prison for seditious conspiracy, was given a full pardon, along with three other top leaders of the fascist group. Meanwhile, in the streets of DC, the Proud Boys marched behind a Trump banner, chanting, “Whose streets? Our streets!” “Fuck Joe Biden!” and “Fuck antifa!
Additionally, Elon Musk, during his Inauguration Day speech to a number of MAGA faithful, appeared to give a “Roman” salute—often associated with Hitlerism. Musk, who was raised in apartheid South Africa, is well known for his far-right sympathies. He recently endorsed the fascistic Alternative for Germany (AfD) and has supported freedom for jailed British neo-Nazi, Tommy Robinson. The pro-Zionist Anti-Defamation League (ADL), excused Musk’s gesture as “awkward.”
One of the most egregious EOs is an attempt to end birthright citizenship—guaranteed under the 14th Amendment. According to the Washington Post, “Trump’s order seeks to reinterpret the 14th Amendment of the Constitution, which grants citizenship to all people born on U.S. soil, a change legal scholars say is illegal and will be quickly challenged in the courts. The birthright order was part of a burst of immigration-related directives aimed at undoing Biden administration policies and wielding obscure presidential powers to launch a broad crackdown along the border and across immigrant communities.” The ACLU in New Hampshire and Massachusetts announced that it is filing a suit on behalf of parents whose children would be affected by Trump’s order; several state administrations have also joined a lawsuit.
He also attacked transgender people with an EO titled “Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government.” According to The Advocate, “It directs federal agencies to rewrite policies and remove references to gender identity. Passports, social security records, and other government-issued identification documents will now be required to reflect only an individual’s sex assigned at birth. Schools, shelters, and workplaces that receive federal funding will no longer be required to accommodate transgender individuals’ gender identities. In prisons and detention centers, the order directs that transgender women be housed with men, regardless of their safety or lived identity.”
Climate change measures rolled back
Trump promised in his inaugural address that he would promote a policy of “drill, baby, drill,” while ending electric vehicle subsidies and the “Green New Deal” (which in reality was never put into operation). One of Trump’s first acts in the White House was to withdraw the U.S. from the Paris Climate Accords—just as he did during his first administration.
Even though the United States is producing more oil than at any time in history, and more than any other country, Trump insists that he will declare a “national energy emergency,” which would enhance his powers to override environmental protections. He has stated his intention to streamline government regulations that may “impose undue burdens” on the mining, drilling, and processing of fossil fuels. He would also open up additional federal lands and waters to oil drilling, while putting an end to leasing areas for wind turbines.
Trump also pulled the U.S. out of the World Health Organization (citing the WHO’s mismanagement of the COVID-19 pandemic), and ended all government DEI programs.
Finally, in a slap in the face to Indigenous people, he switched the name of Alaska’s Mount Denali (in the language of the Koyukon Athabascan people “Denali” means “The Great One”) back to Mount McKinley. (President McKinley was strongly in favor of tariffs. He presided over the U.S. victory in the inter-imperialist Spanish-American war, in which the U.S. took over Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippines as colonies, while occupying Cuba with troops.).
This dovetailed with the chauvinist version of U.S. history (what used to be called “manifest destiny”) that Trump presented in his inaugural address. He asserted that the United States has been built by “Americans who pushed thousands of miles through a rugged land of untamed wilderness.” This mythology conveniently ignores the genocide of Indigenous peoples who had lived in North America for thousands of years, the harnessing of slave labor to clear and farm the fields, and the wars of the 1840s in which the U.S. stole half of Mexico’s territory. In a similar vein, Trump also seeks to rename the Gulf of Mexico as the “Gulf of America.”
Iran and Israel policy
One surprise is the Trump team’s apparent participation in arranging a ceasefire in Gaza that is practically word-for-word the same as one previously proposed by Biden and rejected by the Netanyahu regime. Biden could have made this deal months ago and saved thousands of lives. Obtaining a permanent halt to Israel’s attacks was even within Biden’s ability early on, if his administration had simply cut off aid to Israel. But as a supporter of Zionism, Biden refused to do that. Despite the temporary ceasefire, Israeli troops remain in Gaza. In the meantime, troops and armed settlers are engaged in a murderous pogrom against Palestinians in Jenin and other towns in the occupied West Bank. The threat remains that the Gaza agreement could disintegrate.
Trump’s policy towards Israel will be similar to that of the Biden administration in many respects; he has never been a friend of the Palestinians. In fact, Trump made comments in 2024 that Israel should “finish what they started” and “get it over with fast.” Among his first acts in the White House, Trump rescinded the sanctions that the Biden administration placed against Israeli settlers in the West Bank who had been implicated in acts of violence.
During his first administration, Trump was very tolerant of the expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank, and no point has he criticized Israel’s current genocidal war on the Palestinians. He did, however, criticize the publicity coming from the war, saying, “And the other thing is I hate, they put out tapes all the time. Every night, they’re releasing tapes of a building falling down. They shouldn’t be releasing tapes like that. They’re doing, that’s why they’re losing the PR war. They, Israel is absolutely losing the PR war.”
Although Trump campaigned as a “peace” candidate, he has been most bellicose in his rhetoric against Iran. Trump is likely to impose punishing sanctions on Iran to stop Iran’s alleged nuclear program. The Iranian regime is weakened by dissent at home, a poor economy, and the military reverses they have suffered at the hands of the U.S.-Israeli attacks on Iranian-allied forces in Lebanon and Syria. What is unknowable is whether Trump would back an Israeli military attack on Iran.
In October 2024, Trump rejected U.S. support for regime change and stated, “I would like to see Iran be very successful. The only thing is, they can’t have a nuclear weapon.” What this means concretely is unclear. In his first term, Trump withdrew from the multilateral 2015 Iran nuclear agreement referred to as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). Instead, he opted for a campaign of “maximum pressure,” reinstating sanctions that had been lifted when Iran met requirements of the JCPOA. Any sort of deal Trump makes with Iran will likely face opposition from Iran hawks in his own party and from Democrats. Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu has already stated that “Israel will not be bound by any deal with Iran and will continue to defend itself.”
Farewell, Genocide Joe
Biden’s final speech in office warned that an oligarchy of the wealthy and a “tech-industrial complex” is a threat to U.S. democracy: “Today, an oligarchy is taking shape in America of extreme wealth, power and influence that literally threatens our entire democracy, our basic rights and freedoms, and a fair shot for everyone to get ahead.” Biden should know; he has spent his political career in service to those very elites.
Biden and the Democrats help facilitate the rise of Trumpism. Biden’s “concern” for democratic rights might be laudable if he and his party had not spent the last 15 months slandering opponents of Israel’s U.S.-backed genocide in Gaza. The bipartisan attacks on free speech on campus, under the guise of stopping antisemitism, are a huge threat to all of our rights.
In his last days in office, Biden issued a record number of pardons. He pardoned more than 8000 people, including his son Hunter—who faced 17 years on a tax evasion conviction and 25 for a federal gun offense—five other family members, and some current and former government and military officials whom Trump has pledged to prosecute. The pardons include 6500 people formerly convicted under federal marijuana laws. In one surprising move, Biden commuted the sentence of longtime political prisoner, Leonard Peltier. The conditions of Peltier’s release call for house arrest, not complete freedom of movement.
Biden’s departure marks the end of a terrible presidency. Biden’s legacy will forever be stained by his complicity in Israel’s genocide.
Resistance and independence
While attendance numbers at the recent People’s March indicate a certain level of demoralization, the advent of the new Trump regime makes resistance, unity, and solidarity a necessity. Contrasted to eight years ago, when the Women’s March drew 500,000 to DC and an equal number in protests across the country, this past weekend’s mobilizations only brought a fraction of those numbers into the streets. The opening salvos of Trump’s anti-people agenda—gutting environmental laws, attacking immigrants, LGBT people, and women—makes the construction of a fightback an urgent task. It should also be clear that no one, even his supporters, will be immune from the Trumjpist onslaught.
The lessons of the 2024 election are that workers and oppressed people cannot put any confidence in bourgeois politicians or the courts. The Democrats are not an ally of the working class, and voting for them only diverts us from the necessity of building our own political instrument—a new party based in the working class, its mass organizations, the unions, and organizations of the specially oppressed.
Our power is in the streets! Time and again throughout history, it was the mass action of the working class and oppressed that made real change. No gain we enjoy from Social Security to civil rights to environmental protection was ever handed down by a benevolent ruling class; these changes were wrenched from their hands by the action of the masses.