President Donald Trump, who should focus on economic policies to support domestic corporations, is being criticized for involving personal feelings in corporate management, with claims that he seems to be "trying to become America's chief executive officer (CEO)."
On the 12th (local time), The Washington Post (WP) introduced a case in which President Trump intervened in the management activities of U.S. corporations, reporting that "President Trump acts like a sort of CEO, involved in individual transactions and personnel decisions." Recently, he announced an unprecedented policy requiring semiconductor companies Nvidia and AMD to pay 15% of their revenue from sales in China to the U.S. government and demanded the resignation of Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger, who has been linked to allegations involving China.
Douglas Holtz-Eakin, who served as the chief economist for the Council of Economic Advisers during President George W. Bush's administration, noted, "President Trump is intervening not only at the industrial sector level but also down to individual corporations. This is highly unusual," and he pointed out that "the role of the president is to create an environment that allows others to successfully complete transactions."
Concerns are also emerging from within pro-Trump circles. Stephen Moore, who served as an economic advisor in Trump's first administration, stated, "Good economic policy is to implement policies that benefit all corporations," adding that "I completely agree with what President Trump is doing to make the U.S. economy strong again, but government and business should maintain a distance from each other."
There are indications that President Trump's governance style contrasts with the ideologies of the Republican Party that have persisted for decades. According to WP, the Republican ideology holds that the best thing government can do for businesses and growth is to not interfere with management activities. However, since the inauguration of his second administration, President Trump has been intervening in corporate management on numerous occasions.
Although he has not adopted a clear regulatory approach, President Trump's interference in corporate management directly contradicts his past actions. Republican figures have long argued that government economic interventions such as taxes, regulations, and tariffs hinder market efficiency and productivity. President Trump also criticized then-Democratic candidate Kamala Harris as a "communist" and "Marxist" for the same reason during last year's election.
The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) described President Trump's second-term policies as a "hybrid of socialism and capitalism led by the state in private sector decision-making," criticizing them as similar to the 'state-led market economy' dominated by the Chinese Communist Party. It suggests that the structure allowing private corporations to issue golden shares to the Chinese Communist Party is essentially akin to President Trump's policies.
If such policies continue, there are growing concerns that corruption could be promoted as corporations attempt to curry favor with President Trump. Signs of this trend are already emerging, such as Apple CEO Tim Cook promising an additional $100 billion investment in the U.S. and presenting a nameplate reflecting Trump's preferences.
Previously, The New York Times (NYT) reported that a TikTok-related corporation needing to appease President Trump to maintain services in the U.S. purchased cryptocurrency linked to the Trump family.
Wendy Edelberg, a former chief economist at the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), stated, "Where tariffs exist, exceptions are likely, and where there are exceptions, lobbyists seeking them gather," emphasizing that "this can be very beneficial for politicians sitting on the opposite side of the negotiation table," implying that lobbyists may congregate around President Trump.