On the Side of Trump’s Return to Power in America
America after January 20th
By: Soraya Shahabi

The inauguration ceremony and the official return of Trump to the presidency on January 20, 2025, have been given various interpretations by analysts and media. These range from the beginning of a return to the "Golden Age of America" with the flag and slogan "MAGA," to the "New Trump Era" and the day the "Revolution of Common Sense" began. Some see it as the dawn of a dangerous era marked by crisis explosions, chaos, and divisions, while others call it the "Independence Day of America," the "Sunrise of the Right," and the "Sunset of the Left," and even a "Political Resurrection." The day the trumpet of the "Return of Fascism" sounded, and the beginning of the age of "Oligarch Rule" and "The Government of Billionaires" were also some of the titles used to describe Trump's "resurrection."

Among all these, perhaps the most simplistic and superficial comments come from Žižek. As one of the theorists of the "official left," he claims, "Many commentators expect Trump's government to be accompanied by new, shocking catastrophic events, but the worst possibility is that no big shock will occur at all!" Žižek believes that the "left" (meaning parliamentary leftist parties and figures like Kamala Harris) should accept their complete defeat! They should start their return to square one and begin anew, "in a Leninist way!" Refer to the article "After Trump's Victory: From the MAGA Movement to Mega", published on Radio Zamaneh's website.

However, Trump's sitting not behind bars, or in the criminal chair at numerous courts, where he had been accused of organizing attacks on the parliament and countless fabricated or real social, financial, and political crimes, but instead, sitting on the seat of power for a second time as the 47th president of the United States, is not a shock, but the beginning of rapid transformations. These rapid transformations can only be expressed as the beginning of "revolutionary" changes! A revolution whose consequences and results are still unclear to many in the United States and the world, irrespective of its "color" or final outcome. However, the scene is not so chaotic that the main trends of change during Trump’s second term in the U.S. and in the world cannot be discerned.

For many analysts who have a deeper look at political developments, Trump's return—this time more powerful, aggressive, and confrontational—was neither unpredictable nor unbelievable before the results of the U.S. elections. What is remarkable, however, is the speed and manner of his return. Perhaps that is why many deem it appropriate to label it a "revolution."

This time, Trump has returned with the broad support of not only the most deprived sections of U.S. society but also the most powerful inventors, discoverers, and experts of the "Fourth Industrial Revolution" technologies. He has the backing of billionaires who own the "mother industries," such as Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla and X, Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta (formerly Facebook), Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, and the late Bill Gates, the founder of Microsoft, along with companies like Apple and Google, and many other financial and digital conglomerates. These supporters, who not only bring immense capital and resources but also control vital channels for the global flow of business, financial, industrial, economic, and technological operations, as well as sectors like science, pharmaceuticals, food, culture, and ideology, have returned to power with him.

The explanation that Trump, relying on a group of super-rich individuals and his "billionaire cabinet," has established "oligarch rule" in America and that the risks of this non-traditional "oligarchic rule" are greater than the previous "traditional" aristocratic elites is simply inaccurate. This narrative only seeks to mask the harsh and destructive class nature of traditional parliamentary parties and political movements in recent decades in America and the West. The political parties and movements, as representatives of U.S. capitalism, have long proven their inability to maintain the conditions for preserving American capitalism. Their inability to "bring America back to its golden age" of global economic leadership—Trump’s current platform—despite the destruction of the Middle East, the launching of countless wars, and spending billions on military budgets, is evident. This failure is further evident in the ongoing genocide of the Palestinian people and the inability to find a way out of the historical deadlock facing the system.

For more than three decades, the U.S. bourgeoisie has struggled with the dysfunction of the political structure, parliamentary democracy, political parties, bureaucrats, systemic lies, corruption, and the deterioration of most international and regional agreements, making it impossible to maintain the former unipolar world order of "the West victorious over the East" through military intervention and destruction. The political structure, parliamentary democracy, and its focus on external enemies to justify wars and bombing campaigns have not only failed to maintain the system's interests but have also fostered an environment for the emergence of anti-capitalist, anti-structural movements, especially the working class.

Today, in the absence of an anti-capitalist movement in the U.S., the bourgeoisie has taken matters into its own hands. It has come forward directly to remove the "ineffective" representatives, to solve the same problems, and to find a way out, officially and openly under the banner of "returning America to its golden age." This time, as Trump has explicitly stated and acted upon, this is primarily a "house-cleaning" operation within the U.S. itself. It involves pushing back "cumbersome rules and regulations" both at the top levels and within society, and eliminating "unnecessary" elites, including the political bureaucracy and the "establishment," whose "useful life" has expired.

When Trump states, "America has an opportunity to capitalize on the current global situation. But before anything else, internal challenges must be overcome," he means eliminating all political, cultural, legal, financial, and military obstacles within the U.S. This indicates preparation for more intense, broader, and social battles within America itself. Contrary to the hollow declarations of traditional regime officials, he is not a president for all people but one who has "unashamedly" risen for the direct benefit of his own class.

In this process, he is prepared to go as far as attacking not only the weaker and marginalized sections of American society, such as immigrants, foreign workers, Mexicans, and their families, but also removing "laws" and "bureaucratic hurdles" and sacrificing any part of his own bourgeois class—including individuals, institutions, parties, and anyone else deemed necessary.

This creation of an "oligarchic financial rule" under the "billionaire cabinet" and the problem with the "tech barons" is, at its core, an intra-family battle of sorts within the "aristocracy" of the traditional parliamentary structure, meant to obscure this reality. The U.S. bourgeoisie has removed these "ineffective" representatives from power and is now directly seeking to preserve the overall interests of the bourgeoisie. It has stepped into the field, officially and directly, to find a solution to the unresolved issues of economic growth stagnation and the inability to maintain its former superior global position. For more than three decades, it has tried to resolve this through bloodshed and destruction in foreign lands.

No, ladies and gentlemen, the governments of Biden, Harris, Obama, Clinton, Bush, and in the UK, Blair, Cameron, and Starmer were not governments of the middle or working class, and neither was the "billionaire cabinet" of Trump’s administration. This represents a fundamental shift in the class-political dynamics of American society. This shift reflects the dissatisfaction of some of America’s billionaires—both traditional capitalists and the political, commercial, and cultural elites—who operate on the margins of the major industries and fear their changing position. Trump’s positioning as a “peace-seeker,” though temporary, hypocritical, and limited, is an attempt by the American bourgeoisie to extricate itself from the problems caused by an increasingly ineffective militarism.

The "non-dangerous" predecessors of Trump used the highest technologies of mass killing—from the sky, land, and sea—to slaughter people by the thousands. These operations, carried out behind computer screens like a video game, destroyed homes without anyone being held accountable. The latest of these operations involve the use of artificial intelligence and technology, especially by companies like Google and Microsoft, to track and target Palestinians at their homes. The same political structures and parties that control the economy, technology, and the fate of people in the U.S. and the world have turned the world into a quagmire in the pursuit of “returning America to its golden age,” with the ultimate goal of maintaining "America as the master of the world."

Trumpism, or the “MAGA” movement, represents a challenge to the establishment and the traditional system that has safeguarded the interests of American capitalism. It brings forth demands that correspond to significant issues concerning the immediate, tangible realities faced by citizens both in America and around the world. This movement has already transformed the political, social, cultural, and ideological structures of the U.S., realigning the global bourgeoisie and altering relations between the “East and West”—including with China, Russia, and the U.S. It is also reshaping working conditions and daily life for millions of people, leading to deeper divides and polarization.

One of the casualties of these shifts within the bourgeoisie is the diminishing power of aristocratic groups that have survived on the periphery of "mother industries"—the very industries that fueled Trump’s rise. These elites have built empires in “false” industries driven by spectacle, media, and lavish consumerism, becoming multi-billionaires and “powerful” figures. This group has attempted to hide the inability of the bourgeoisie to resolve its structural issues through strategic misdirection, maintaining “short-term” policies that have only deepened the crisis beneath their feet.

Another section of the bourgeoisie, which tried to conceal its “parasitic” role in politics and societal governance, relied on wars, “sanctions,” censorship, and foreign “laws” that they deemed “illogical,” “irrational,” and “foolish” from the perspective of their own liberal bourgeoisie. That empire has collapsed, even before the new "MAGA" empire under Trump has fully solidified its position in American society. This is not something that Trump’s movement has achieved easily or directly.

In the political and social arena, the previous establishment gave rise to a bourgeois opposition, equally detached from the material lives of Americans and the world’s people. The “anti-globalism” movement, which called for “national” and “isolated” economies, and the “rainbow” movement, which sought special privileges for various marginalized groups while exploiting real issues of discrimination, are among the consequences of the previous empire’s rule in the U.S.

Another victim of Trumpism’s resurgence is the left-wing fringe, which has become non-social, “anti-science,” and “superstitious.” For more than a decade, its elite has shaped a “political aristocracy” in intellectual and academic circles in the name of opposition. Through its economic, political, and international agreements (i.e., Trumpism), the anti-globalist right has completely disarmed this “non-socialist,” non-working-class left. Trump has seized the flag of “economic isolationism,” regardless of its feasibility, pushing the “anti-globalist” left, the “rainbow” left, and the “rootless” left to the margins.

In its familial struggle with this “national left,” Trump’s policies, which have canceled political and social privileges for their “elite,” are leading to a broad attack on the rights of women and ethnic and racial minorities in the U.S. The left, seeing its own irrelevance and “retirement,” considers the chaos of the world as its own consequence. This “elite,” by discrediting science, biology, and the material world, has left the American working class and the greatest innovators of the Fourth Industrial Revolution with no “leftist” leanings, pushing them toward Trump’s vision of change.

Instead of tackling issues like discrimination, inequality, and poverty, the left has been preoccupied with creating “sacred” and “superstitious” new religious doctrines, such as “LGBTQ+” and “identity”-based movements. Its primary achievement has been the “right to silence” critics and extract privileges from educational, judicial, and social systems, elevating their elites to the highest political, cultural, and ideological platforms globally. This position, with Trump’s arrival, became the true victim of the material realities imposed by the “forward-thinking” members of their own class.

The “Revolution of Common Sense,” driven by the American bourgeoisie, has returned to the objective reality of “the God of capital,” embracing science and the material world, where "two powers"—labor and capital—struggle for control. This revolution could not have taken place within the outdated and stagnating structures of the past. The American bourgeoisie, in addition to eliminating the “decorations” of class, including “parliamentary democracy,” various rules, regulations, and “obstructive” norms, is now forced to silence discontent within its own ranks. The deeper-rooted superstition and religion in American society must now go to war with the “new,” rootless religion of the post-Fourth Industrial Revolution world. Trump’s extraction of Orthodox Christianity from the depths of the Middle Ages and his positioning as its representative serves this purpose.

The grumbling of the left, represented by Ms. Harris, about the violation of “freedoms,” the “danger of fascism,” and so on, rings hollow when protesters of the massacre of Palestinians in the streets of London, New York, and Washington are arrested, or when criticizing the Israeli government leads to job losses. The efforts of these elites to silence dissent are so egregious that it is impossible to consider their institutions as anything less reactionary or more “free” than Trump and Trumpism.

Trumpism, having shed the excuses and lies of the traditional system, directly wields the sword against the weaker sections of society. In opposition to the “new religion,” Trump has sought help from medieval “ancestors.” Unable to champion “atheism” against the new religion of ignorance, Trump turned to Christianity, the church, and its representatives to secure his place as “God’s messenger” and to “restore America’s greatness.”

If the left’s religion is socially baseless, relying on a small elite class, Trump’s religion has historical capital—rooted in the Crusades and governance. The reversal Trump is imposing is simply the unmasking of the reversals that the traditional structures, through hypocrisy, censorship, and “political correctness,” had imposed. The defeat of the new century’s superstition and religion by the values of the Middle Ages could only be achieved through a “working-class movement” free of any religion, God, or fate.

Ultimately, what brought Trump to power was the need for “optimism” and hope for a better future, both from the working class and the oppressed in America. In the absence of a progressive, socialist, and working-class movement, this optimism flowed into the heart of the bourgeoisie. Many interpreted Trump’s deeply problematic statements and reactionary values as a “return to reason,” “opposition to structural values,” and “opposition to lies and corruption.”

Exposing Trump’s wealth and assets by his rivals in the Democratic Party and the traditional establishment as his “weakness,” like all rival campaigns, only turned into its opposite and solidified Trump’s rise.

Not all scientists, inventors, and owners of the largest industries of the century—who hope that overcoming the barriers to the Fourth Industrial Revolution will lead to greater scientific and technological achievements—became fascists overnight, nor did Trump. Trump, despite his hatred and hostility toward foreigners, is not a fascist but a diehard nationalist who has removed the veil of political decorum. The dangers Trump poses, like those of Bush, Blair, Biden, and all the “cleaner” figures in American politics, may be less or more severe—if American society gives him the chance.

If American society can capitalize on the opportunity created by the political-ideological rift within the highest levels of the capitalist system and rise up against Trump, it may pave the way for a movement led by the working class and oppressed people. Communism and socialism may find a path within these internal political-class struggles in America to offer an alternative socialist economy.

Trump is a nationalist, like all American presidents who have stepped into major struggles for the survival of American capitalism—both in America and globally. The optimism that brought him to power, after the “fever of victory” subsides, may lead the working class in America to rise with high expectations and direct involvement.

Trump’s foreign policy, economic isolationism, and its consequences for the U.S. and the global economy, his rift with Europe and traditional Western allies, NATO issues, and his policies regarding the U.S., China, Russia, Palestine, Ukraine, and Iran, will bring new forces into play, particularly in the U.S., Europe, Israel, and the Middle East. The impact of Trump’s rise in these areas will undoubtedly lead to significant shifts in the global bourgeoisie structure, which will require separate analysis in future discussions.

January 27, 2025