The richest man in the world pumped almost $500 million into the Republican election campaign - and lost. But even after the Democrats' clear victory, he and other tech oligarchs will probably remain the winners in the long term. The reasons extend beyond Trump.
Elon Musk can afford this defeat: the SpaceX boss invested almost $500 million in the Republican election campaign - and lost badly. Musk's donations are the highest ever in a US election campaign, but measured against his assets of almost a trillion dollars, the richest person in the world only spent around 0.05 percent of his wealth.
But the shift in power in the US Congress should remain manageable for Musk, not only financially, but also politically. Voters have punished Trump's alliance with Musk and other ultra-rich tech oligarchs such as Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg and Peter Thiel and their shameless self-enrichment. The Democrats can now block Trump's appointments, there are likely to be investigations into his crypto dealings and perhaps even into Musk's role as head of the alleged efficiency authority Doge in the first months of Trump's second term in office. The new Democratic governor in his adopted hometown of Texas, Gina Hinojosa, could also put obstacles in his way - she has sued for access to Musk's political agreements in the state.
But the tech billionaires' declared goal is not jeopardized by Trump's crushing defeat: to use technology as a tool against democratic participation and to make the world so dependent on their corporations that no one can ignore them, let alone regulate them. The new American oligarchs have progressed so far towards this goal that the upcoming change of power in Congress can only be the beginning of rebuilding the cornerstones of US democracy. Under Trump, the United States has moved toward what political scientists call a competitive autocracy: voting continues, but the playing field is tilted in favor of those in power. Votes do not decide who really governs. For this to happen, the rules of the game would have to change, not just the majorities in Congress.
Another two years of escort from the White House
In the short term, Trump continues to hold his hand over the tech billionaires and their corporations. “The truth is that they are not in control,” he said calmly on Fox News on election night about the Democrats’ epic victory. "You can send me 50 great pieces of legislation that you all love. And I'll send it back to you with a nice stamp: veto." The day before the election, he had already told the "New York Post" with regard to supporters like Musk: "We simply have to protect these people." If necessary, he wants to preemptively pardon Musk and other banned people to protect them from prosecution.
This is not the only reason why little will initially change in the increasingly authoritarian oligarchy in the USA. But also because the winners have something else in mind than restructuring the system. There are suggestions for this though. The priority, however, is to reduce the cost of living for their voters and curb Trump's corruption - as the incoming majority leader in the Senate, Democrat Chuck Schumer, announced immediately after the election.
Only a few of his party colleagues, such as James Talarico, who was elected senator in Texas, or Jon Ossoff, have so far seriously called for AI regulation, taxes for billionaires, a break-up of tech companies, reform of party financing or the Supreme Court. California Governor Gavin Newsom, one of the party's greatest hopes, had even spoken out against the billionaire tax, which was voted on in his state parallel to the midterms.
The rules of the game remain as they are
The US political system has long been so deformed that the tech oligarchs have little to fear even after Trump's term in office. Since the Supreme Court's infamous "Citizens United" ruling in 2010, there have been no limits on the influence of corporate money on election campaigns, nor transparency. Since a ruling in 2024, US presidents have largely been legally immune even after their term in office. With this combination, the Supreme Court opened the door to oligarchy. Musk and Trump have long since moved on: 20 percent of all campaign donations at the federal level in 2024 came from just 300 billionaires - not even including secret donations via dark money funds.
What that means in practice was seen twice in this election. Alex Bores, a former Palantir employee from New York, is one of the most prominent critics of the technology companies and a proponent of regulating artificial intelligence. As a candidate for Congress, he didn't even make it through the Democratic primary. A $140 million campaign fund called “Leading the Future” opposed him. Behind the fund are tech billionaires such as OpenAI founder Greg Brockman, investor Marc Andreessen and Palantir co-founder Joe Lonsdale.
The world's first billionaire tax will probably also fall through in California. The union that nominated her was able to raise just $20 million for its campaign. Google founder Sergey Brin alone donated more than $100 million to the counter-campaign. In total, his super-rich allies raised $330 million to prevent the levy. Nothing is likely to change in terms of the privileges of the billionaire class: like the nobility in pre-revolutionary France, they effectively pay no taxes. The low contributions of this new monetary aristocracy to the community, even the business-friendly "Wall Street Journal" headlined at the beginning of the year, "are becoming a problem for the economy."
Too big to be regulated
In addition, the USA has become dependent on the tech companies and their billionaires like Musk: With AI, robotics and rocket technology, they control the key technologies for many areas of society. At the same time, the corporations are fundamental to national security, systemically relevant and therefore, like the banks before the 2008 financial crisis, "too big to fail" - too big and too important for the government to let them fail.
The tech bosses also sit as advisors on the "President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology", the expert council for science and technology, directly to Trump in the White House. Their technologies have long been indispensable not only for Trump, but for every future US administration, whether for the CIA, NASA or the military effectiveness of the Pentagon. Their increasing merger with the state has created a tech-political complex that permeates US society: media, opinion formation, elections, administration and military.
Given this balance of power, which candidate can afford to take serious action against tech moguls like Musk? To give up their power and their tools? To tax them more? To effectively regulate your AI and its corporations? In order to survive in election campaigns and to implement their political concerns, the Democrats will have to largely come to terms with the interests of the tech world.
Only after 2028 will it become clear where the USA is heading
The thought leaders of the right in Silicon Valley have taken into account the fact that voters would one day defend themselves against the increasing power of the new elite: Curtis Yarvin, the most important philosopher of tech authoritarianism, declared last year that without a complete autocratic takeover of power under Trump there would certainly be a political backlash: "Anyone who only makes half a revolution is digging his own grave."
Historically, such resistance in the USA has always formed when the upper class demonstrated its power too openly. More than 100 years ago, the super-rich luxuriated in golden palaces while millions lived in poverty. At that time, decades of unbridled expansion, in which billionaires such as oil baron John Rockefeller, banker JP Morgan and steel magnate Andrew Carnegie made fortunes with illegal monopolies and bought US politics, were followed by the so-called progressive era. It brought the USA the first income tax, the eight-hour day, the end of child labor, consumer protection, antitrust authorities and finally women's suffrage.
Something similar is conceivable today. The current concentration of wealth has now reached even greater proportions than in the "Golden Age" at the end of the 19th century and contains similar social explosives. In order to defuse it, we would not only need appropriate majorities in both chambers of Congress, but also a US president who dares to seriously regulate or even destroy the tech giants of the AI era. The chance to do this will probably not come until 2028 at the earliest, when Trump's successor is elected.
More than a century ago, Theodore Roosevelt showed how it could be done in dealing with the monopolies of the robber barons. "Corporations (...) should be regulated when they are proven to act contrary to the public good," he argued in 1901. "Large corporations only exist because they are created and protected by our institutions." It is therefore the right and duty of the government to ensure that it acts in accordance with the institutions of the democratic state. The task is even more monumental today than it was then.
