'New and very uncertain territory' as billionaires pay their way into Trump presidency

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Evan Osnos, staff writer for the New Yorker and author of the newly published "The Haves and Have-Yachts," talks with Jen Psaki about the rise of American oligarchy and how billionaires have had their way with the Trump administration, and the power of civic outrage to take the country back.  For more context and news coverage of the most important stories of our day click here: https://www.msnbc.com/

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00:00Joining me now is Devon Osno, staff writer at The New Yorker and author of the brand new book,

00:04The Haves and Have Nots, Dispatches on the Ultra Rich. There are so many great stories in this book,

00:11and I want to talk about that. I just wanted to start with, I mean, before the break,

00:15I brought up Trump's scrapping Operation Klepto Capture in a win for Russian oligarchs everywhere,

00:20I suppose. They're the big winners in this. Even domestically, as I just mentioned,

00:25you open your book with the scene of top billionaires sitting right by Trump at his

00:28inauguration. What's your reaction to how much everything in this administration seems to be

00:33for sale? Because that seems to be much more out in the open than anything has been in the past.

00:39Yeah, you're right. I mean, in many ways, Jen, it feels as if this is a golden age for the oligarchy.

00:44I mean, not only overseas in Russia, as you see, he has now gotten rid of this program,

00:50which the U.S. and allies were using to put pressure on oligarchs who are close to Vladimir

00:55Putin. But here at home, there are not only the very visible ways in which he has sought to

01:00surround himself with the most powerful business interests in this country, but also every day

01:05behind the scenes. Jen, I'm hearing about it from people who work in government affairs,

01:09who work in lobbying in Washington, who say we have never seen an exchange of money for influence

01:14on a scale like this. It is staggering. Even people who have been doing this for a long time,

01:19a million dollars for a group dinner with the president, money that goes to a super PAC called

01:23MAGA Inc., or five million dollars for a one on one meeting. You know, even by the standards of

01:28pay to play, this is new and very uncertain territory. One of the interesting points you made in the book

01:35is that that visual we all sat and watched and sort of commented on of the inauguration, right,

01:42was not really the start of the oligarchs building power in this country. It wasn't the start of all of

01:48these billionaires sort of coalescing around Trump or even trying to saddle up to politicians in

01:54Washington. And it was an interesting point because I think at the time, a lot of us said,

01:59well, this is the start of this, right? And it really wasn't. So tell us more about that.

02:03Yeah, there was a fascinating moment. You'll remember in the final days of the Biden administration,

02:07he talked about the rise of what he called an American oligarchy. Scholars of that subject told me

02:13that is the first time they've ever heard the word oligarchy uttered in the Oval Office.

02:18And it is a real signal moment in the history of American power and money. Look, there has always

02:23been money to some degree in politics, but it has grown so dramatically over the course of the last

02:29two decades. It's almost easy for us to overlook. But take one statistic, Jen. In 2004, in that

02:35presidential election year, billionaires in this country contributed about $13 million to the election.

02:40Sounded like a lot at the time, except that in the most recent election, they contributed 200 times

02:46more, $3 billion into the election. There's just no way in which we can't recognize the fact

02:51that money is now shaping our politics more than it ever has in this country.

02:56We've seen this is clearly causing a tremendous amount of outrage. There are protests all over

03:01the place nearly every day. We've seen anti-Trump protests growing like hands off in April and no

03:06kings, which is a demo coming up next weekend. Organizers 5051 are pushing for people to boycott

03:13billionaire-owned brands, which is everybody's looking for kind of an action to be taken.

03:18Does public action like that help limit these oligarchs? Or what should people understand about

03:23the impact of it? Yeah, that's actually a really interesting fact of history. The pattern is

03:28unbelievably clear that when you look at countries that have dealt with the rise of oligarchy and the

03:33places as disparate as South Africa, Ukraine, the Philippines, one of the very clear patterns

03:39is that public pressure, civil society is one of the forces that can actually push that back.

03:45And in fact, we've seen it here recently in Wisconsin, the effort to stand up in effect to

03:52Elon Musk's attempt to use his money to win the result by the result of that election.

03:57You know, that was a case, as scholars will put it to me, they said the only solution to oligarchic power

04:01is to dilute and balance it with citizen power. And the solution to that is, frankly, it's the kinds

04:09of protests you were just talking about. In some cases in history, it's been labor strikes,

04:13it's investigative reporting, but you have to keep up the pressure. It's a sustained movement over

04:17time. And we've seen already in the first few months of this administration that the public is

04:21simply not comfortable with what they're seeing. And some of these protests have been much larger than

04:25the organizers expected. I wouldn't be surprised if the ones coming up are too.

04:31you

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