Pulitzer Prize Historian: You Won't Notice Until It’s Too Late - Anne Applebaum

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The Billionaire President Problem

When Trump entered office in 2017, his reported net worth stood at $2.3 billion. Two years later, it ballooned to $6.5 billion — an unprecedented financial windfall for a sitting president. Applebaum flags this as a fundamental break from American history: "We've never had a president running businesses while in office," she notes, her voice carrying the weight of someone who has studied power structures collapsing across continents. The Saudi government invested $2 billion in Jared Kushner's fund not out of admiration, Applebaum explains, but because Kushner is Trump's son-in-law and now serves as the administration's Middle East negotiator. He's negotiating with his business partners. The appearance of conflict overwhelms any attempt at denial. This marks what Applebaum calls "high-end corruption" — decisions made not for Americans' benefit, but for presidential profit. When tech CEOs parade to the White House offering sycophantic praise (despite calling Trump a "dictator" years earlier), when regulatory pressure targets companies that refuse White House demands, when government contracts flow to presidential allies — these aren't isolated incidents. They're symptoms of a system where proximity to power determines who prospers. The corruption isn't subtle. It's structural. And it's accelerating.