N. T. O. & Y.

RE: https://mstdn.social/@sglerman95814/116099878194145909

1/
Krugman puts it so clearly and is for sure worth a read, but let's get to #NamingNames because I'm not OK blaming billionaires in the most generic sense so that these democracy-shredding oligarch wannabes can keep their names and their reputations out of the spotlight.

* Elon Musk.
* Timothy Mellon. Oil magnate who uses family fortune to shred the social safety net and put a grifter like Trump in office.

🧵️

Feb 20 at 12:23amWeb
Show threadN. T. O. & Y.Feb 20
2/
#NamingNames cont'd...
* Richard & Elizabeth Uihlein. Owners of Uline supply co. (quit buying their stuff!) who used fortune to smear Dem candidates in exchange for a multimillion dollar tax cut.
* Miriam Adelson, casino magnate who threw nine figures into a super PAC to elect Trump and wants to add a "Book of Trump" to the bible.
* Ken Griffin, Citadel hedge fund CEO who donates billions to GOP candidates.
Show threadN. T. O. & Y.Feb 20
3/
#NamingNames cont'd...
* Jeff Yass, high-freq trader who uses tens of millions in a bid to eliminate public schools and backs GOP candidates who helped him pay just 17% tax on over $10,000,000,000 in income.
* Paul Singer, (Elliott Management private equity CEO whose M.O. is basically: liquidate companies, fund candidates who slash programs to help the people he puts out of work, use shell companies to avoid paying taxes, rinse & repeat.
Show threadN. T. O. & Y.Feb 20

4/
I don't know much about Americans for Tax Fairness, but Krugman links to their April 2025 report in his Substack*, which is worth reading for details.
https://americansfortaxfairness.org/billionaires-buying-elections-theyve-come-to-collect/

* also, somebody encourage Krugman to get off of Substack! There are better platforms that don't showcase Nazis!

Billionaires Buying Elections: They’ve Come to Collect - Americans For Tax Fairness

KEY FINDINGS Just 100 billionaire families poured a record-breaking $2.6 billion into federal elections in 2024, one of every six dollars spent altogether by all candidates, parties and committees.  That’s two-and-a-half times the roughly $1 billion spent by individual billionaire donors in 2020.  Billionaire political spending is up 160-fold since the Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens …

Americans For Tax Fairness
Show threadN. T. O. & Y.Feb 20

5/5
And here's the graph from that report that I find most noteworthy. The U.S. Supreme Court decided on #CitizensUnited v. FEC in 2010, allowing #billionaires to effectively buy political outcomes under the guise of free speech.

Without a doubt, historians will recognize Citizens United as a watershed moment in the #enshittification of America.

/end