A Farewell to the American Democracy

By Anisella Joesph '25 and Julia Paes '25

Picture by Andrea Villegas Ayala ‘26

On January 15, 2025, Joe Biden gave his farewell speech to America, cautioning citizens about the potential shift of American democracy towards an oligarchy. An oligarchy is a system where a small group controls a country, organization, or institution. Five days later, Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerburg, and Jeff Bezos were all sitting in front during the inauguration of Donald Trump. What do all these men have in common? These three men have all in some way supported Trump and have used their wealth in favor of Trump winning the election. Many billionaires in Trump's cabinet, worth almost over $300 billion, while Biden’s cabinet was about $118 million. In the sense that oligarchy is being ruled by a few in this context, America is heading towards being ruled by the wealthy, and these people will get to govern our lives and impact our everyday lives. Though an oligarchy is growing, that does not mean that Trump could use his executive orders to reshape the political landscape. His executive orders have been criticized for being harmful to the political system. These executive orders all have consequences that will impact people's lives. Within his first week, many of his executive plans which consist of banning birthright citizenship and a national emergency to use federal money to build a wall near the U.S.-Mexico border. These actions have sparked debate about the appropriate authority for making such a significant decision and the long-term effects on democratic values. Critics state that this would be against the constitution because it undermines the foundational values that this nation is built upon. The controversy of this executive order highlights the deep division within the country and raises the question of the balance of power in our current government. Another thing that is currently going on in our economy is that federal workers in SF are protesting on Trump's cutbacks. Current federal workers are being told that they are going to be laid off or to resign.The reason Trump wants to cut down the size of the government is because he says that the workers are sloppy but in reality there are too many workers. This was included within Project 2025 with one of the authors Russell Vought, who advocates for centralizing the government and that the federal government is dead and is not producing enough for the public. The protest in San Francisco is only one example of the turmoil for federal workers. As the situation continues to cut workers, it will show people how the changes will affect the economy overall and in our own personal lives.