How the Trump Administration Became an Activist Investor

by Maggie Severns, Gavin Bade, Josh Dawsey and Meridith McGraw



There is free-market capitalism and state capitalism. Now, there’s Trump capitalism.

In recent months, the president has extended his hand into American business in unorthodox and, to some corporate leaders, alarming ways—from progressive-style demands to cap credit-card rates to assertive deals grabbing government shares in private companies.

Some executives are so worried Trump will ask for a stake in their company that they have prepared for Oval Office meetings by rehearsing what they would say to fend off the president’s advances, lobbyists involved in the preparations said.

Others welcome Trump’s attention. United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby appealed to Trump with the idea of creating a “national champion” airline during meetings with Trump and top officials at the White House, people familiar with the discussions said.

United asked for regulatory permission merge with American Airlines, and top Trump aides discussed whether the U.S. should take a stake in what would be one of the biggest airlines in the world, according to people familiar with the meetings. Trump later said he didn’t support a merger, American Airlines was resistant and United abandoned its bid.

The administration talked with Spirit Airlines about providing a loan of up to $500 million in return for warrants that would have given the U.S. a significant stake in the low-cost carrier, The Wall Street Journal reported last month. When the company offered 80% in exchange for the government bailout, Trump suggested 90%, according to people familiar with the matter.

But Spirit bondholders didn’t want to subordinate their claims to the federal government, according to a person familiar with the matter. The government pulled out of negotiations, and Spirit shut down Saturday.

Administration officials are stoking the president’s instinct to shift more authority over private-sector industries to Trump and his team. The Trump administration has announced direct investment stakes in at least 10 companies, including a 10% equity stake in Intel and a “golden share” of U.S. Steel, which grants the government power to influence company decisions.

We’re seeing the government get more involved in different aspects of the economy, which is a pivot off the more traditional Republican approach of the last century,” said Kelly Ann Shaw, deputy assistant to the president for international economic affairs in Trump’s first term.

The Trump administration obtained significant shares of critical-minerals companies to counter China’s dominance in rare-earth minerals, which are crucial for industries and national defense contractors. Trump’s deputy chief of staff, James Blair, is interested in stakes from more companies, said a person familiar with the matter.

“You have China with 70% chokehold over the production of critical minerals and 90% over processing,” Shaw said. “If you just let the market do its thing, we’re not going to be able to diversify away from Chinese dominance.”

Yet Trump’s approach extends well beyond national-security concerns, which startles many large U.S. companies that fear an expansion of government power in their industries.

After the Trump administration took a stake in Intel, lobbyists said they talked with clients who sought meetings with the president and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and wanted to know what to say if Trump asked for a stake in their companies. The main question for executives: Would they be willing to give the administration something? If not, they wanted to know, What’s the best way to change the topic to friendlier matters without causing friction?

Decades of broken policymaking by Washington, D.C., hollowed out America’s industrial base and left Americans dependent on foreign imports for goods that are critical for our national and economic security,” White House spokesman Kush Desai said. “The Trump administration is accordingly rectifying America Last policies that have left our country behind while embracing the traditional free market policies that do work, from deregulation to tax cuts.”

In December, Trump met with The Wall Street Journal and said, “When people need something, I think we should take stakes in companies. Now, some people would say that doesn’t sound very American. Actually, I think it is very American.”

Lean left

White House officials say Trump’s approach to economic policy reflects longstanding voter frustration with big business. Some of his recent interventions were taken with an eye to the midterm elections, according to people familiar with his and his team’s thinking.

Trump’s political team in January flagged a speech by Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren that featured a comment about Trump’s campaign promise to cap credit-card interest rates. The president had again raised the idea. Warren said Trump was missing in action. “Why is she being critical of me?” Trump mused to an aide while watching the speech.

Soon after, Warren received a call from an unknown number and picked up. It was Trump.

The president told her the rates were too high, and she said they could work together to lower them. In an interview, Warren said she believed the traditional Republican free-market approach to economics was failing. “Donald Trump seems to be the number one Republican to figure that out,” she said.

Trump called for the interest-rate cap to begin in late January, a deadline that came and went without action from the administration.

Last summer, Trump’s economic team had brainstormed with home builders about getting more Americans to buy houses by cutting regulations to bring down costs, according to people at the meetings.

Then Republicans suffered losses in the November elections. Trump aides let home builders know that deregulation was dead, said people who were in the meetings or were briefed about them. Trump’s poll numbers on the economy were falling, and advisers wanted policies that spurred housing and could be easily understood by prospective home buyers, those people said.

In January, Trump announced policies that marked a turnabout, including a ban on institutional investors such as Blackstone from buying homes. The shift left lobbyists and trade groups unsure what to advise home builders anxious about any more Oval Office surprises. In March, the White House released an executive order on deregulating housing that didn’t touch many topics previously under discussion. Some in the industry refocused their hopes on Congress.

In a meeting with his cabinet in January, Trump echoed Democrats’ complaints about affordability, blaming health insurers for rising healthcare costs. He said he wanted to lower prices and hold “big insurance companies accountable.” His new healthcare framework calls for low-cost insurance alternatives and for striking pricing agreements with pharmaceutical companies.

“We pay the money, billions and billions, really trillions of dollars going to insurance companies,” Trump said. “We want that money to go to the people.” Details of the proposed pharmaceutical agreements haven’t been disclosed.

A White House official said the administration continues to work with Congress to pass a healthcare plan.

“This is a much different Republican Party and a much different leader than I think we’ve seen in the last 50 years,” said Suzanne Clark, president of the Chamber of Commerce, which represents many of the largest U.S. corporations and for decades has advocated for a smaller government role in the economy.

‘Horrible, horrible’

Western countries have oscillated for centuries between robust state interventionism, most pointedly President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal-era of the 1930s, and a more hands-off laissez-faire economic view that rose to prominence around the mid-1970s.

Many industrialized nations, particularly in Western Europe, have retained a larger role for the government in the economy, including partial or full state ownership of significant companies and sectors such as healthcare. China grew to an economic superpower in recent decades by fully embracing a robust state role in a capitalist economy.

During former President Joe Biden’s administration, some advisers said the government needed to abandon 1990s-era globalism in favor of industrial policies to revive U.S. manufacturing. The advisers felt the U.S. needed to rely less on overseas supply chains, especially for goods central to national security.

That push resulted in 2022 legislation that put billions of dollars into boosting domestic semiconductor manufacturing. The CHIPS and Science Act was passed to reduce U.S. reliance on foreign supply chains. Trump labeled it a “horrible, horrible” corporate giveaway last year, and his administration has in some cases used CHIPS Act money to negotiate equity investments in companies picked by his administration.

The Biden administration also considered launching a U.S. sovereign-wealth fund, Biden national security adviser Jake Sullivan and others said in interviews. They hoped to create a government-funded investment vehicle to take stakes in companies seen as valuable for national security but which needed help developing.

The idea never got off the ground, partly because administration supporters ran out of time, former officials said. It would have likely required both legal scaffolding and money appropriated by Congress. Trump proposed creating a sovereign-wealth fund on the campaign trail around that same time, but little has come of it.

To Trump allies, the Biden administration opened the door to the government’s stepped-up role in the economy and reflected bipartisan support for moving further from a laissez-faire approach.

“We’ve crossed a Rubicon as a country in terms of getting more comfortable with the government playing a slightly heavier role,” said Shaw, Trump’s first-term economic adviser. “But overall, the U.S. economy is still undoubtedly a capitalist democracy, and so what we’re talking about is fiddling around the edges instead of wholesale transformations of our economy.”

To critics, the president has embraced a form of state capitalism that expands the authority of the executive branch, recalibrating America’s traditional balance of powers. Democrats say the president has intervened in the media and entertainment sector, including on behalf of Paramount Skydance, owned by David Ellison, whose father, Larry Ellison, is a longtime Trump supporter.

The president’s policies appear to have “a side effect of concentrating power either in the hands of Trump himself or in the executive in general,” said Ilias Alami, an assistant professor of political economy at the University of Cambridge who has written a textbook on state capitalism.

Trump last August called for the resignation of Lip-Bu Tan, chief executive of chip maker Intel, after news reports on Tan’s history of doing business in China. His team had no idea that Trump wanted a share of the company as they orchestrated a meeting, a person with direct knowledge of the discussions said.

Four days later, Tan met with Trump at the White House, and 11 days later, the Commerce Department announced it would take a 10% stake in the company for $8.9 billion.

“He walked in wanting to keep his job, and he ended up giving us $10 billion for the United States,” Trump said at a news conference last August. Last week, the president said the U.S. investment in Intel had generated $30 billion in gains over the past 90 days.

The U.S. corporate stakes are held by various agencies including the Pentagon and the Commerce Department. The Trump administration hasn’t said what, exactly, the government might do with profits or dividends from the companies it has taken stakes in.

Sullivan, Biden’s former adviser, said he worried that the administration’s investment in companies might warp markets and reward cronies. He also acknowledged that some of Trump’s efforts reflect a new, bipartisan consensus on using industrial policy as a tool to enhance national security—even at the expense of free-market economics.

“We are on a new path,” Sullivan said. “The U.S. government has to bring tools to the table that solve vulnerabilities for the U.S. that the market doesn’t solve.”

I just hope he picks Orren Boyle over Reardon metal.

What happens when dems get control of the Federal government and have this much control/influence in so called private business. My thought is its a move to even bigger Federal government which just leads to more corruption and that corruption will be even worse in business than it already is. Government involved in business never works out well for the middle class and lower class people. The government is historically inefficient at everything it does. Honestly it looks like a step towards socialism to me.

I don't like the govt picking corporate winners and losers. D or R.

I don't like the govt picking corporate winners and losers. D or R.

I disagree.

"Had the government not bailed out General Motors, projections suggested that nearly 1.9 million to 3 million U.S. jobs could have been lost in 2009–2010. This figure includes GM employees, suppliers, and dealership staff, as analysts predicted the liquidation of the automaker would have caused a devastating chain reaction throughout the auto industry"

Not everyone moves all over the country. My father, my grandfather, my great grandfather, my great great grandfather, and my great great great grandfather are all buried within 25 miles of my place. I'm not moving anywhere. I worked in automotive for 20 years, four hours from Detroit. 1.2 million square feet and 1200 employees. That was just one business, not counting the thousands of our suppliers we had or the contractors we used. Not to mention all of our customers around the world we sold our car parts to.

You are more than welcome to think that say our current approx. 7 million unemployed people statistic should have been increased by almost 50% say and that everything would have just been fine and worked itself out but like I said I disagree.

We were a one income home, with two kids born in 03 and 08... yeah we could have found work like you are saying, somewhere, but those are the numbers you read about that skew the unemployment numbers. Working somewhere for half as much just to scrape by is still unemployment and doesn't make everything all peaches and cream.

You already stated your thoughts on welfare and disability. Seems to me you'd let all the plants close and then start complaining about how we pay them unemployment. There is no way we should have allowed the big three American automakers to fail so foreign automakers could prosper. I'm not sure I understand your position but plenty of businesses have already left Ohio for you.

The Midwest factories across the bread basket of America have been having plenty of closures and problems and were happy to see some help. How has your investments done since the big bailout in 08? Mine have done pretty good. Bailing the automakers out wasn't some terrible thing that wrecked our economy. I mean if the economy was super crappy now b/c of the bailout I could maybe see your argument but things seem pretty good right now so I'm not sure what all of this theoretical discussion is about.



From 1990 to 2026, Ohio experienced a significant reduction in its manufacturing and corporate base, losing several Fortune 500 companies and iconic regional brands through acquisitions, bankruptcy, or relocation.

Reason Foundation
Below is a list of major companies that went out of business, were acquired (ceasing to operate as independent Ohio entities), or relocated their headquarters.
Major Ohio Corporate Closures, Mergers, and Relocations (1990–2026)
National City Corp. (Cleveland): Acquired by PNC Financial Services in 2008 following the financial crisis.
NCR Corp. (Dayton): Relocated headquarters to Georgia in 2009 after over 100 years in Dayton.
Big Bear Stores (Columbus): Iconic grocery chain that closed or sold all stores by 2004.
Revco D.S. (Twinsburg): Drugstore chain acquired by CVS in 1997.
Skybus Airlines (Columbus): Ceased operations in 2008.
Standard Oil Company (Ohio/SOHIO): Completely integrated into BP, losing its Ohio identity.
Factory Mutual: Left the region via mergers.
Ohio Brass (Mansfield): Ceased production in 1990.
Tappan Appliances (Mansfield): Bought by Electrolux in 1992 and plant closed.
American Crayon (Sandusky): Closed/dissolved.
General Motors (Moraine Assembly) (Dayton): Closed in 2008, affecting thousands of jobs.
Delphi Automotive Systems (Dayton): Various plant closures during the 2000s.
Rubbermaid (Wooster/Cortland): Acquired by Newell; Ohio operations significantly scaled back, including the 2015 Cortland closure.
Federated Department Stores (Macy’s/Lazarus): While still existing as Macy's, the regional HQ and iconic Lazarus brand (Columbus) was absorbed into NYC operations.
Roadway Express (Akron): Merged into YRC Worldwide in 2003.

Retail Chains and Other Entities
KB Toys: Originally headquartered in Massachusetts but had a massive presence in Ohio malls before going out of business.
Big Lots (Columbus): Filed for bankruptcy in 2024, closing multiple Ohio stores.
Express (Columbus): Filed for bankruptcy in 2024, with major store closures.
Melt Bar and Grilled (Cleveland): Closed many locations during financial restructuring.
First Brands Group (Tiffin/Bowling Green): Closed plants in 2026 after bankruptcy.

Key Contextual Factors
Dayton’s Decline: Dayton lost several major companies, including Standard Register and Mead Paper Company (merged/restructured).
Cleveland Manufacturing: The region has seen a steady decline in factory jobs, with companies like Premier Manufacturing Corp. and Goodrich Corp. closing plants between 2010 and 2015.
WARN Notices: Data indicates high-volume layoffs and closures continuing through 2025 and 2026 in manufacturing and services

The government caused the GFC by changing the rules on who could get a loan to buy a house

Then they bailed the banks out first, then everyone else including the auto industry

All the new money sloshing around is why everything is much more expensive today than it should be,,,

Also the main reason asset values have increased as much as they have

Same thing happened again with Covid,,,,


It’ll happen again,,,,

The only question is when?

Have you written a manifesto yet? Geez girl. Whats got you so riled up lately?

The democrats are so far gone im not sure that even means what it used to.

Anybody who thinks the government hasn’t already had its hands in businesses for years has never operated one.

I'm not riled up lol. I've been saying the same thing SINCE the GFC, lol. Well, I guess maybe I am a little riled up, because I would expect this stuff from the democrats, not the republicans.

“ Capitalism only works if it has controlling factors” is false

“Controls” are the problem and bring cronyism,over regulation,barriers, etc

They create more problems and cause unintended consequences like what caused the GFC

The government caused the GFC by changing the rules on who could get a loan to buy a house

Then they bailed the banks out first, then everyone else including the auto industry

All the new money sloshing around is why everything is much more expensive today than it should be,,,

Also the main reason asset values have increased as much as they have

Same thing happened again with Covid,,,,


It’ll happen again,,,,

The only question is when?

I remember when MA BELL wanted total control of telephones .
A monopoly , the government stopped it, yet under a different control of government, that changed!
More to think about than just one or two companies in todays world.
The idea was to have competition , to keep prices down.
Seems that's a lost cause anymore.
Capitalism only works if it has controlling factors, as a limit as to how much control each has.
Seems that a certain party felt they had more control over Spirit airlines than they really had.
Yet because of certain factions, got away with it.

Just a side note , the Wall Street Journal isn't much different than CNN.

“ Capitalism only works if it has controlling factors” is false

“Controls” are the problem and bring cronyism,over regulation,barriers, etc

They create more problems and cause unintended consequences like what caused the GFC

Stock market is all time high. Unemployment is an close to an all time low. You still seem to be wanting to talk theory when we have actual data and Im not sure I understand why.

Country in what shape? Stock market with all time highs?

The market is not the only measure of a healthy economy.

You have married 30 year Olds working full time jobs and they can't afford a house, they're putting off having kids, they worry about an accident or disease bankrupting them with medical debt but all they hear is "economy is great, look at the market!" Coming from a legion of boomers who grew up during the most prosperous economic time in world history

Let me correct you...you have 30 year olds that buy $8 coffees on their way to work, get home and turn on their $150 a month cable TV, go out to eat 3 times a week, go to the movies or honkey tonk every weekend, drive $700+ a month brand new status symbol vehicles, pay someone else $80 to change there oil because they dont know how or are too lazy......the list goes on. Young folk cant afford housing because they are pee poor with their finances and cant decipher between wants and needs.... rant over

Do you really believe the only thing holding young people back from home ownership is $8 coffees and cable TV? Do you think the prospects for the average up and coming 20/30 year Olds are equal or better than the boomers had it?

I read that comment of his, started to reply, and then figured it's just not worth it. With so-called conservatives with the mindset of OW and OB, it's no wonder this country is in the shape it's in. SMH.

Depends where you are....starter homes here are 700 - 800g, nice 3 bedrooms are hovering just under a million, new larger homes 1 1/2 - 2 mill plus. it's insane and the reason locals are selling out and the kids have to move to a lower cost state....

it seems money has no value to some people...where they got their money is a mystery....

If you have free market capitalism you would be able to live in a creation of your own not subject to zoning and building codes. Most people could figure out how to build their shack. Lived in a place like this for 35 years. It is your neighbors/builders/government that would not tolerate this freedom. You are stuck in the housing industrial complex.

If you can’t build a shed, addition, home on your own property with out government approval

You truly don’t own it

We have property taxes, we just rent our paid for land. lol

It's not $8 coffees.

Edit- graph may be hard to read but the red bar is price adjusted for inflation

Long term home ownership is a poor investment

Do you really believe the only thing holding young people back from home ownership is $8 coffees and cable TV? Do you think the prospects for the average up and coming 20/30 year Olds are equal or better than the boomers had it?

Long term home ownership is a poor investment

Maybe if your strictly a numbers person with little emotion... my farm has been a terrible investment from a numbers standpoint, Great lifestyle though and good for raising kids that end up "normal". There's a peace that comes with owning a home, what's the price of peace?

There’s much to be said both for and against this article. Against might consider the “too much government” that DOGE was created to get us out of. In the end, we laid off tax collectors. Then hired them back, to collect the government’s share of business taxes and loans.

I'll also call out people who post blatantly false "facts" without a single source to support their outlandish claims.

OH.... I'm pretty sure that prior to 1913 we did not have 143 million people receiving Medicare/Medicaid or 42 million people receiving food stamps. May be a wee bit difficult to pay for all that via tariffs alone.

Prior to 1913 we didn't have a central bank and debt backed currency.

It's all related

From 1879 to 1914, America experienced the most spectacular economic boom in human history. Real wages doubled. Industrial production exploded 4x. Population grew from 50 million to 100 million while living standards soared across every income level.

Showed also the value of establishing an immigration policy.

Bryce

Current immigration policy will probably be counter productive. There has to be a better policy than super restrictive and super loose. America needs population growth in order to have workers who pay the bills in order to support all the true american retired baby boomers.

Long term home ownership is a poor investment

Not sure about down there, but here it’s the best thing a guy can do if you can. It takes money to make money in that game. My grand kids will thank me for the my property investments. It’s one of the things that never depreciate around here. Crop, bush, swamp……don’t matter. If you can afford it buy it, even borrowing if you have to.

Are you talking about your home or property?

There is a difference

Its a govt scam.they just let you think you own it,but as soon as you quit paying your rent (property tax) you find out who really owns the property.

Walmart getting back 10.2 billion in stolen money from illegal tarriffs.Other companys lining up.
Sounds like a genius,lol.

...... that one question is getting pretty close to several questions.........

One question.
While our country was growing and becoming stronger and more powerful, on tariffs , did we go to income tax on our population?

Wilson came into the White House like a “priestly visionary,” intent on expanding economic opportunity for people at the bottom of society and eliminating special privileges enjoyed by the nation’s richest and most powerful citizens. Wilson focused first on tariff reform, pushing through Congress the Underwood-Simmons Act, which achieved the most significant reductions in rates since the Civil War. He argued that high tariffs created monopolies and hurt consumers, and his lower tariffs were especially popular in the South and West. The act offset lost revenue by providing for a small, graduated income tax as authorized by the Sixteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which was adopted on February 25, 1913, before Wilson took office.

Next, Wilson tackled the currency problem and banking reform. Since the Civil War, Democrats and agrarians had wanted a more flexible money supply and system of banking that would allow adjustments in the amount of money and credit available in times of economic expansion or crisis. By the early twentieth century, bankers and businessmen had also begun to demand reform. After the Panic of 1907 (the third such in many American’s lifetime), a special congressional investigating committee, the Pujo Committee, demonstrated to the American public the extent to which a handful of banks and corporations controlled the nation's wealth. Reformers wanted a strong federal system that would regulate credit and oversee the nation's currency.

One question.
While our country was growing and becoming stronger and more powerful, on tariffs , did we go to income tax on our population?
Why did the GREAT DEPRESSION happen? Why did we go off the gold and silver standards to back our money?
When you can answer that , we might start to get along.
Remember it all happened within 30 years.

So the answer to a more powerful and strong county is tariffs. When all countries do them, will they all be powerful and strong? Tariffs are just a tax that make it possible for domestic suppliers to charge consumers more. The U.S. became more powerful primarily due to the industrial revolution.

The Federal government does so much more then it did in 1912 and the only way to go back to tariffs as the main source of revenue would be unacceptable to 99 percent of current voters.

Yes, I do have to ask, as I still don't think you are getting it.

You will NEVER hear me blame the rich or big business.... I agree with you on that point!

And I don't really much disagree with anything else you have said either. The government IS corrupt. The government has made most people slaves to the government. There are untold amounts of waste and theft in the government. All of that is true.

But I think you are missing the big picture. And the big picture is a big part of why tariffs will never work.

WHY is it hard to support a family on one income anymore?

WHY, with the exception of advanced products such as semiconductors, computer components, etc., do we not export the goods we used to export?

WHY do we import so much from countries like China or Vietnam?

(Hint: the government IS involved in the answer, but that is only part of it.)