I think at this point it’s speculation. Your speculation is a reasonable one. But with Trump, I think there’s another very reasonable one: he’s a natural fascist so they’re just trying to buy a future unspecified favour. Maybe it’ll be to avoid having to give up a bigger stake in the future, or to avoid a big tax, but they probably don’t know exactly. I’d compare it to all the techbros donating to Trump’s campaign and turning up to his inauguration - they don’t know exactly what they’re getting out of that deal, but they know they’d rather pay homage to the king than be on his shit list.
So to me this is evidence of corruption, even without a known deal having taken place. They know that Trump plays favourites with the enormous power he wields, so they want to be the favourite.
Agreed 100% we are both speculating at motives. So if we set that aside the question then becomes would it be better for institutional shareholders to have this 5% or for a wealth fund like the Alaska permanent fund to have it.
Even in a case of this being about bribing the trump admin it would result in all future administrations having access to this as well. This would require a bill in Congress to implement so I say support it and look at the bill to see if there is a way that trump or someone else can abuse it, then we can get out the pitchforks
I think at this point it’s speculation. Your speculation is a reasonable one. But with Trump, I think there’s another very reasonable one: he’s a natural fascist so they’re just trying to buy a future unspecified favour. Maybe it’ll be to avoid having to give up a bigger stake in the future, or to avoid a big tax, but they probably don’t know exactly. I’d compare it to all the techbros donating to Trump’s campaign and turning up to his inauguration - they don’t know exactly what they’re getting out of that deal, but they know they’d rather pay homage to the king than be on his shit list.
So to me this is evidence of corruption, even without a known deal having taken place. They know that Trump plays favourites with the enormous power he wields, so they want to be the favourite.
Agreed 100% we are both speculating at motives. So if we set that aside the question then becomes would it be better for institutional shareholders to have this 5% or for a wealth fund like the Alaska permanent fund to have it.
Even in a case of this being about bribing the trump admin it would result in all future administrations having access to this as well. This would require a bill in Congress to implement so I say support it and look at the bill to see if there is a way that trump or someone else can abuse it, then we can get out the pitchforks