How the new class of billionaires solidified outsized political influence

Lisa Desjardins:

Many New Year's traditions are meant to bring prosperity in the months to come, but America's relationship to wealth is, in a word, complicated.

Last year saw the return of a billionaire to the Oval Office, and President Trump stacked his inner circle with other wealthy individuals, including former adviser Elon Musk, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, and Education Secretary Linda McMahon, all successful business people who are billionaires.

This solidified seats at the table for the ultra-rich after a presidential campaign season that saw the wealthiest 100 Americans spend over a billion dollars on federal elections, according to a Washington Post analysis. But, as billionaires' influence has grown, so too has Americans skepticism.

In a recent Washington Post/Ipsos poll, 58 percent of respondents said billionaires spending on campaigns is bad for the country.

As we begin this midterm election season, we take stock of the intersection of money and politics with Washington Post reporter Beth Reinhard.

Beth, you cite some staggering statistics in your research here and reporting. In 2004, you found the richest Americans, the 100 Americans who were the richest, spent $46 million on elections. That was a peak at that time. But, by 2024, that had ballooned to over $1 billion. Now it accounts for one in every 13 dollars spent in the election.

How did we get here?

Beth Reinhard, The Washington Post:

Yes, it was a pretty staggering increase.

There's a few reasons that we're seeing this outpouring from the billionaire class. One obvious reason is the billionaire class has grown. Forbes counted 902 billionaires in the United States this past year. That's more than in any other country in the world. And that's twice as many as there was just a little more than a decade ago.

So the billionaire class is much bigger and it's much wealthier. If you're a billionaire, spending literally hundreds of millions of dollars on election is really just change in your pocket. They basically can spend what too many of us just seems like unlimited money.

And there's other reasons too. I mean, a big one is the rulings by both the Supreme Court and other federal courts that have really loosened the reins on campaign finance regulation. And billionaires are often turning to super PACs. They can give unlimited amounts to these organizations.

And those in turn are spending record-setting sums on politics.

Lisa Desjardins:

It is unquestionably a lot of money.

But you also looked into where it's going, and you found some 80 percent of the money in the last election went to Republicans. That's a big shift. Can you explain how you figured that out? And, also, what's happening here?

Beth Reinhard:

Right.

So we looked at the 100 richest Americans in the country, according to Forbes. So that's a slice of the billionaire class. And we found that 80 percent of their spending in the 2024 election did go to Republicans. And a big part of that is the tech industry.

We know that the tech industry in the last few years has created extraordinary riches for a certain amount of people. And while Silicon Valley in the past was traditionally more liberal, it has shifted sharply to the right.

We saw that in Elon Musk. He's sort of the biggest, best example of that. Elon Musk, the richest man in the world, he used to lean Democratic. We know he heavily, heavily spent on behalf of Trump and other Republicans, nearly $300 million in 2024. And many others in the tech industry shifted with him.

And so these richest Americans are currently gravitating toward Trump's Republican Party.

Lisa Desjardins:

What do billionaires get out of this?

Beth Reinhard:

That's a good question.

I mean, we talked to a few billionaires, which, maybe not surprisingly, they're not the easiest group to get on the phone. But what some of them told us that they liked about Trump is they feel that he is obviously a businessman. He had never held elected office before coming president.

They like that he has this sort of distaste for government, this view of the deep state, as Trump calls it, of this bureaucracy. He has radically dismantled that regulatory structure, especially during his second term. And businesspeople like that.

Lisa Desjardins:

You know, courting wealthy donors is nothing new in America, and especially the richest donors in politics. Is this the scale that's different? Or is there something else bigger that has shifted here?

Beth Reinhard:

It's both the scale and sort of the brazenness of it under Trump. I mean, Trump is someone who has always surrounded himself with wealthy people and enjoyed the trappings of wealth and never sort of shied from it.

He's flung open the doors of the White House to billionaires like we have never seen before. We saw an unprecedented number of billionaires sitting on stage at his inauguration. It's just much more open and in your face and, like you say, the scale is more than we have ever seen before.

And I think it's just going to keep going in this direction. There's expected to be trillionaires in the next decade. And so I think we have really reached a point of no return here.

Lisa Desjardins:

Last year in Wisconsin, Elon Musk tried to affect the state Supreme Court there. He lost with voters. Can you help us, as we're heading into this midterm election, where politicians talk so much about the middle class and working class, what are the pros and cons of having billionaires on your side?

Beth Reinhard:

I think anyone in politics who's being candid will acknowledge that, if you have access to a billionaire, it makes you very attractive as a candidate.

But the Musk example shows that there are limits and that there can be a backlash. When Zohran Mamdani, who like his sort of mentor Bernie Sanders, started lashing out at billionaires, saying they shouldn't even exist, we saw billionaires band together in New York City to try to block him from getting elected New York City mayor. And they lost.

And, in Wisconsin, like you said, there were protests against Elon Musk spending some $20 million on a Supreme Court seat. So, while billionaires are having this influence, politicians are more dependent than ever, there are limits to their influence. There are times when it reaches a point where it becomes sort of a negative thing to have billionaires spending on your behalf.

Lisa Desjardins:

Beth Reinhard of The Washington Post, thank you so much.

Beth Reinhard:

Thank you.