Trump vs Soros: The billionaire battle of two very different worldviews
Trump singled out billionaire philanthropist George Soros when he signed an executive order to dismantle “domestic terrorism networks.”
Donald Trump signed an executive order last week to dismantle “domestic terrorism networks,” specifically left-wing groups that he accuses of funding them in order to incite violence. Speaking to the press in the Oval Office, Trump said there is one person who is “at the top of everything,” George Soros.
The president piped in after Attorney General Pam Bondi was asked about reporting in The New York Times that said half a dozen US attorneys at the Department of Justice have been instructed to investigate the billionaire philanthropist and Democratic donor. “I don’t think anybody has to ask,” Trump said.
“Because if you look at Soros, he’s at the top of everything,” he continued. “In fact sometimes I ask, ‘Could he be involved in this many things?’ But, he’s in every story that I read. Stories that I read keep talking about Soros. So, I guess he’d be a likely candidate.”
Why is Trump targeting Soros?
Soros, who was born in Hungary in 1930 and lived through the Nazi occupation surviving the Holocaust, has been a boogeyman for the right and authoritarian regimes for decades.
His non-profit Open Society provides grants to “individuals and organizations across the globe fighting for freedom of expression, transparency, accountable government, and societies that promote justice and equality,” according to its webpage.
Since 1984 his Open Society Foundations have given over $32 billion of the hedge fund billionaire’s personal fortune that he made in the financial markets to these efforts. His early philanthropy focused on giving scholarships to Black South Africans living under apartheid and promoting open political climate in Hungary while the nation was under the yoke of communism.
While donations from Open Society mainly go toward left leaning causes, he has also given to organizations like the Cato Institute, which promotes libertarian policy positions.
Soros has been railed against by Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu, Russia’s Vladimir Putin, and Hungary’s Viktor Orbán, who just so happened to have received a scholarship to Oxford in 1989 from Soros, explained the Financial Times. In an opinion article, the newspaper’s US national editor Edward Luce says that “Soros would be the cherry on Trump’s cake,” in his efforts to silence critics.
Trump may make Soros the face of Antifa
While there is no such thing as an ‘Antifa’ terrorist organization, Luce says that “Soros’s foundation looks like Trump’s stand-in for Antifa.” This is even though his foundations condemn violence and do not fund proviolent groups, the FT editor and columnist points out.
Luce notes that it could be fairly easy to get some kind of indictment against the billionaire, citing a New York judge who once “famously said a good prosecutor could ‘get a grand jury to indict a ham sandwich.’” However, Luce says, “getting a jury to convict is a much steeper hurdle.”
Nonetheless, with the power that Trump wields, aided by powers given to the US Treasury by Congress last year to revoke the tax exempt status of non-profit groups, the president “could throw Soros into IRS and DoJ investigatory hell for years to come.”
In light of the James Comey indictment last week, which Trump explicitly called for, he warns that “a season of Washington show trials may now be getting under way.”
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