The billionaire oligarchs and the blue-collar base will always be odd bedfellows. They will have to find new uses for one another now that the Party has complete control over all branches of government.
Historically, the blue-collar base has used the billionaires as psychological role models. The base expresses their desires to get rich and have status over other people through affinity with the billionaires, in the hopes that some of their luck will rub off, or the hope some sort of direct payment will occur, such as a raise or stock market boost. When you hear the term "successful businessman", this is an expression of the idea that having money equals competence and wisdom. The base spends their lives trying to figure out money, so it makes sense to them that only a smart person could do this well.
Meanwhile the billionaires have historically had a use for the blue-collar base too. Primarily this use includes voting, donating, and generating ad revenue on the billionaires' social media platforms. The base are the people you as a billionaire seek to manipulate. They are, in the billionaire's minds, both fools and the gatekeepers to power.
The friction is occurring because the billionaires have a very different mindset than the blue-collar base. Ramaswamy and Musk express a desire for their employees to perform with excellence, because that attitude was critical to building their financial empires. They are now treating the base like they are employees.
The blue-collar base is having none of it. They voted Trump so that they wouldn't have to be excellent or work hard. Deporting immigrants and building the wall was supposed to leave employers with no other choice than to hire the blue-collar base at higher wages. The casual racism was supposed to create a superior white caste, an honor it would be unnecessary to work for. And the whole stream of excuses about how the "woke mob" was poisoning everything offered those who habitually resist self-accountability an easy explanation that they could accept. MAGA was never about self-improvement or high achievement for the blue-collar base. It was about venting grievances and frustrations onto scapegoats like immigrants, liberals, and China.
Now we have the DOGE group trying to tell the base that they need to change (specifically, become more workaholic) like some kind of bootstraps-believing boss at work. However, the base still believes what they were told about how the elimination of the scapegoats will lead to national and personal greatness without any hard work involved.
To the base, this talk about H1 visas being necessary for industrial policy or their favorite cultural memes being counterproductive sounds like backsliding. The billionaires are probably right about America's loser-celebrating culture, but they ran for office on scapegoating - not on the base putting in extra hours or tutoring their kids.
Trump's challenge is to rein in these voices and keep the message on the scapegoats. Deportations, trade wars with China, and annoying liberals could easily consume the next 4 years and give the base hope to vote for in the 2028 elections, if there are elections. And if Trump or his progeny is to overturn term limits and become a dictator, the path to that outcome is paved with scapegoats, not self-improvement bullshit spoken by out-of-touch rich people.
The American right is overdue for a night of the long knives or Stalinist purge anyway. The DOGE crew better watch themselves or they might become the next scapegoats. Perhaps Trump would like the look of the courageous leader who banished the treasonous woke billionaires. They are, after all, breaking the first rule of politics which is to always blame someone else.
