There’s a new crime boss in town, and he’s the old crime boss with the gloves off. There was plenty of crime in the first Trump administration, but much of it was behind a gauzy veil. It mostly had to do with conflicts of interest. He never divested himself from his businesses and, according to reports, made $160 million by directing foreign countries to his companies. On the home front, he was getting wealthier by getting those with business before the government to stay in Trump hotels, holding conferences there, often paying well above the rack rate. Reportedly, even the Secret Service stayed at Trump International and other Trump hotels at six times the going rate!

His kids were also getting enriched by doing business with corporations and foreign governments cozying up to their father. (Remember the $2 billion the Saudis gave son-in-law Jared Kushner for the investment fund he was creating?)  Back then, Trump gave lip service to draining the swamp. Not even a whisper now. Today, he is open to anything that will enrich himself.

What’s happening now is so much worse! In the second administration, the kingpin himself is a convicted felon, and he has his chief, unelected and never-vetted henchman, Elon Musk, to do some of his dirty work for him, trying to kill off government agencies and eliminate long-serving civil servants, many with levels of expertise not easily replicated.  Musk effectively bought his access, spending hundreds of millions in campaign donations to get the boss back in the Oval. A bribe by any other name would have the same stench. The benefit to Musk?  Protecting the billions of dollars his SpaceX company already has in federal contracts, grabbing more contracts for his other companies like StarLink and Tesla, and lightening the pesky regulatory hand that was becoming annoying for his various business interests. (Tesla is apparently getting $400 million from the government to build armored vehicles. I wonder how many charging stations there are in the Obukhovskiy district outside Kiev.)

Musk’s non-agency, non-vetted Department of Government Efficiency (“DOGE”) has canceled or terminated government agencies created and funded by the U.S. Congress.  Sometimes Musk has publicized the names of individuals on whose backs he has painted targets, threatening their security. There are few guardrails on their behavior.

The first weeks of the second Trump administration seem nothing less than a glide path to a crime spree. In apparent violation of government oversight laws, he and Musk rubbed out 17 independent inspectors general whose mission was to rout out fraud, waste and abuse. Trump fired the head of the Office of Government Ethics, the highest so-called “ethics czar” in the federal government, with oversight of conflicts of interest. He has declared the government will no longer be prosecuting under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, green-lighting American bribery abroad as a mere cost of doing business. Earlier this year, Trump started a crypto business ($Trump), the share prices of which promptly took off, while immediately he signed an executive order to ensure that digital regulation is gentle.

Like any crime boss, Trump is driven by revenge, including going after members of the Justice Department who were in any way involved in indictments of him. His new Attorney General, Pam Bondi, has already created a task force to investigate those like Jack Smith, Alvin Bragg and Letitia James who went after Trump. The President’s values were perfectly reflected in his pardon 1600 criminals in the January 6 insurrection, including violent ones. He just pardoned Illinois Governor Rob Blagojevich, serving an eight-year prison term for trying to sell Barack Obama’s vacated Senate seat and other corrupt practices. (Trump had already commuted Blagojevich’s sentence in his first administration.)https://substack.com/home/post/p-157020773

Trump also directed prosecutors in Manhattan to drop bribery and conspiracy charges against New York Mayor Eric Adams on with the apparent quid pro quo that the Mayor work with ICE to round up undocumented migrants, in some cases defying city ordinances. If Adams doesn’t follow Trump’s bidding, Adams’ indictment could be reinstated. Trump’s action prompted the resignation of at least seven federal prosecutors.

Trump’s A.G. Pam Bondi, has already eliminated several task forces that went after Chinese representatives stealing America’s corporate secrets, Russian oligarchs violating international sanctions, and foreigners intervening in our elections. Under one of Trump’s executive orders, Bondi suspended enforcement of the Foreign Agents Registration Act as well. Under another order, the administration scrubbed Homeland Security’s  Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) protections against malign foreign interference in our elections by countries like Russia, China and Iran. The President who condemned his predecessor for opening southern borders to criminals among asylum seekers is apparently welcoming aggressor nations to walk right in.

Numerous lawsuits, including several by organizations like Public Citizen, have been filed to halt these violations of law and the Constitution, but Trump, Musk, Vice President Vance and sinister aide Stephen Miller are openly questioning whether the courts have the authority to stop unlawful action’s by the nation’s top executive.  Musk and other MAGA acolytes are even saying such judges should be impeached!

A January 2025 YouGov survey found that two-thirds (68%) of Americans believe members of Congress would take bribes if the opportunity arose, and they felt the same way about governors and mayors. But they also feel the same way about judges, corporate executives and the media, leading me to fear that this cynicism is feeding widespread public apathy about what’s happening today.

So what will stop this rogue administration? The Trump-packed Supreme Court? The Republicans in Congress are abdicating their Constitutional responsibility to provide checks and balances. The Democrats, for their part, seem to be numb, lying back, hoping that Donald Trump’s overreach will let him fall of his own weight so they can step in and save the country.  The question is, given Trump’s still standing in the polls, by the time that happens, will there be any country left to save? 

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