EDITORIAL
Trump’s Power Play:
Capitalism in Crisis

Feb 23, 2025

In the space of a month, Donald Trump has made it clear how he intends to govern: with a heavy hand, with as much power as he can grab.

Trump’s executive orders all have one thing in common: They are claiming more and more power for the president.

Trump claims he has the power to fire independent inspectors general for no reason. He says he can take control of departments and agencies that Congress had created to be independent. He and his buddy Elon slash budgets and jobs, stopping money that Congress allocated.

Trump also claimed the power to interpret the Constitution above and beyond the Supreme Court with his order ending Birthright Citizenship.

Trump’s billionaire backers subscribe to the idea of the “Unitary Executive", the idea that the president IS the Executive Branch, and so should have direct control over every department within it. They say that Congress and the courts don’t have the right to control any aspect of the Executive Branch; only the president does. The goal is to put the president above the other branches and give the Presidency massively more power.

How much power he is able to grab for himself remains to be seen. Congress does not seem to be in any hurry to grab back the powers Trump has claimed for himself. Republicans are going right along with it, and Democrats are making only weak protests. Various judges have already blocked a number of those executive orders, but those are likely to move up to the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court has already made clear how it leans, with its ruling that presidents are immune from prosecution for anything they do while they are president.

Even by trying these moves, even if not successful, Trump is testing the waters for what might be possible in the future. And even if not successful right now, these moves could set a path for the gathering of even more power—dictatorial power—in the hands of one person.

But this is not just one person’s desire for power. There is a whole administration working through a whole plan. And behind all of them, there is a whole class, the bourgeoisie, saying that this flirtation with dictatorship is okay.

This is the mark of a society in crisis. The Capitalist class knows that for them to keep increasing their profits, the working class is going to have to suffer more and more. Protecting their profits produces more instability in their system, needing more attacks on the working class—producing more anger. They know they will need a heavy hand to come down on the working class, and they are ready to accept a dictator in the Oval Office if they feel they need it. When the time comes, they know they can’t afford even the mirage of “democracy” that this government provides. Trump’s moves pave the way, no matter how far along the path he gets.

This is true on the world stage, too. Trump demanding Ukraine’s mineral resources, ordering Europe around, threatening tariffs on Mexico and Canada—this is the American State, and the American capitalist class, telling the world that the mask of diplomacy is off. The American capitalist class is hungry—hungry for resources, hungry for profits. That also can produce only more instability, with the real possibility of widening wars. Again, the working class—of the world—will be the ones to pay, and again, the capitalist class will have even more need for a strongman government.

The only thing that makes sense for the working class to do—is to get ready to protect itself, collectively. And NOT to expect others, Republicans or Democrats, to save us. Whatever they do, it is not in our interests. And whoever is president, they will use that power against us.

This system, the world, is headed to greater crisis. We can’t stop that from happening, but we can be ready to fight for ourselves, using the collective power WE have.

And we can wrest a new society from the crumbling of the old.