Anyone who wants to keep up with the opinions of President Trump knows they go to his social account of truth. There, its reasoning is found on a panoplia of issues, including military strikes in Somalia, rates on Canada and Mexico, relations with Russia, the causes of a collision of fatal planes, the American property of the Gaza Strip and a workmanship budget now before the congress.
On Wednesday, for example, after the initial interviews of ceased the fire between the United States and Russia during the war in Ukraine, he took the account to attack the leader of Ukraine. “Think about it, a modestly successful comedian, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, convinced the United States of America to spend $ 350 billion dollars, to go to a war that could not be won, who never had to start,” said the Post by the President. “Zelenskyy moves better quickly or you don’t have a country.”
In a sense, these statements are similar to how Mr. Trump has transformed Twitter, now called X, into his megaphone in his first term, when the administration officials declared that his posts are official communications of the White House.
But a big difference stands out: Mr. Trump is the largest shareholder of Trump Media & Technology Group, the company that has Truth Social, and therefore benefits directly if his posts guide the traffic to the site. Even if he put his Trump Media shares in a trust controlled by the eldest son, the president remains the main draw of the platform which is the company’s signature product.
His social posts of truth are only an example of the intersection of the official role of Mr. Trump and the media of Trump. On Wednesday, with an extraordinary move, Trump Media sued a justice of the Brazilian Supreme Court who is supervising multiple criminal investigations on Jair Bolsonaro, a former Brazilian president that Mr. Trump described as one of his “great friends”.
The case, which accused the judge of illegally censoring the right -wing voices on social media, seemed to be an effort to put pressure on the foreign judge while considering whether to arrest Mr. Bolsonaro.
Trump Media also provides for expanding from social media in financial services, opening another kingdom for conflicts of interest. This company would have involved investment vehicles that experts in the sector provided would need the approval by the Securities and Exchange Commission. Trump has appointed Paul Atkins, an long -standing republican commissioner, to be president of the agency. He is awaiting confirmation from the Senate.
In another apparent mixing of interests, Trump has chosen Devin Nunes, CEO of Trump Media, to serve as head of the President’s Consultative Committee of the President and Scott Glabe, general councilor of the company, as a member of the Board of Directors.
All this adapts to a scheme of much more daring violations of the rules that once ruled the conflicts of interest of what they occurred in the first mandate of Mr. Trump, when foreign officials and others in search of his favor crowded with Mar-a -Lago, at his Florida resort and the luxurious Trump Hotel near the White House, say lawyers and experts.
“The potential for conflicts of interest has expanded and deepened the relative also for the president’s first term because he has a stake in a much wider range of companies than when he was the last to the White House,” he said Daniel I. Weiner, an expert government of the Brennan Center for Justice, a non -partisan Think tank has focused on questions with democracy. Even the aspect that the president’s personal interests are intertwined with the public interest “is very corrosive for our political system,” he said.
Harrison Fields, a spokesman for the White House, said in response to the questions of the New York Times on the possible conflicts of interest of the president that “President Trump is committed to using any direct communication line to the American people. Next to his consistent interactions With the press body, this retains its inheritance as the most transparent president of history.
When asked to comment, a Trump Media spokesman criticized the Times, saying that he was doing false insinuations, but did not face the questions relating to his company.
Trump Media does not bone on his strong dependence on the fame and popularity of Mr. Trump. In a deposit of the last week with the century, the company observed that Mr. Trump has the discretion of minimizing his social posts of truth, “which could have a significant negative effect on business”.
But this is exactly what he should do to avoid mixing his private financial interests and his official role, said John Pelissero, an expert in government ethics at the University of Santa Clara. “It should, like other presidents in the past, only use official communications from the White House when he talks about the government and not the company he owns”.
The communications of Mr. Trump also serve to increase X, who is owned by Elon Musk, now the highest councilor of Trump and an employee of the special government. The social messages of Trump’s truth of presidential import are usually republished on Musk’s social media platform, generally after a range of several hours, in an attempt to strengthen traffic on social truth.
Trump has about 101 million followers on X, compared to almost nine million social truths, a number that has grown from its election in November.
“Whether through the truth, X, Instagram or any other social media platform, the president and the White House will continue to speak directly to the American-uncompromising changes compared to the last four years,” Fields said in response to questions including the storage of the president on X.
While social media companies are only freely regulated at the federal level, the Trump Media plans to expand in financial services and the products will put it more exactly under the competence of the federal regulators.
Trump Media declared at the beginning of this month that he planned to invest up to $ 250 million in the company to offer financial products that will be developed with Charles Schwab, one of the largest intermediation companies in the country and a small investment company of the New Jersey, YorkVille Advisors. The experts in the sector said that federal regulators could feel under pressure to give a treatment in favor of these products.
Starting now, the commissioners can only be fired for cause, but the Trump administration is increasing a legal challenge for the independence of the century and various other regulatory agencies. An executive order signed on Tuesday requires the revision of the White House of their proposed regulations, states the power to block the expense for the efforts that are in conflict with the presidential priorities and declares that the agencies must accept the interpretation of the Department of Justice of the law as binding.
The financial services sector is also supervised by the office for the financial protection of consumers, a federal guard dog agency that the White House is now trying to close. Trump defined the agency a outbreak of “waste, fraud and abuse” managed by a “vicious group” whose sole purpose is to “destroy people”.
Supporters indicate the fact that the Bureau has returned about $ 21 billion to consumers through its application actions.
At the beginning of this month, Russell T. Vouaught, who manages the management and budget office and has been appointed new interim director of the consumer agency, ordered the staff and contractors of the Bureau to interrupt the Work. A federal judge ordered a temporary intervention to mass layoffs, cancellations of data and financing cuts to the Bureau on Friday, but the future of the agency is deeply in doubt.
Without that guard dog in progress, it will be easier for financial services companies to manage the Roughshod on consumers, said Kathleen Clark, professor of law at Washington University of St. Louis, specialized in government ethics. In light of Trump Media’s plans, “it is not surprising that he wants to destroy him,” he said.
Ethical experts also warned during the presidential campaign that if Mr. Trump had been elected, the social truth could be a simple way to try to influence it. Foreigners, companies and others who try to influence it could buy actions of companies or advertising on Truth Social in efforts to increase the values of the shares and enrich the Trump family.
“A foreign nation no longer has to rent the floor of a hotel to align the pocket of President Trump,” said Mrs. Clark.
Since Trump created Trump Media in 2021, the company has undergone heavy losses and has fought to generate entrances from the advertising on the social of truth or through video streaming. Last year it recorded $ 3.6 million revenue – 12 % less than the previous year – and $ 130 million. Most of the costs apparently linked to a merger and advent as a public company.
However, it has $ 777 million in cash, apparently generated through the merger and sale of actions, mainly in YorkVille. Its market value of $ 6.6 billion is almost 2,000 times its 2024 revenues.
While Mr. Trump is not an officer or director of Trump Media, he owns 53 percent of the company’s shares, a participation now evaluated at around $ 3.5 billion. He transferred those actions to December to a controlled trust exclusively by Donald Trump Jr., his eldest son who is a member of the company’s board of directors.
But more legal experts have said that the action does nothing to face the connections between his personal financial interests and his role as president.
“That it is a trust is completely irrelevant,” said Mrs. Clark, “because in the end the money ends up in the Trump pocket”.
Julie Tate Research contribution.