Republicans shrug as 'socialist' Trump accusations fly

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump has overseen an unprecedented melding of the private sector with the federal government — so much so that critics say it smells of socialism.

Since Trump re-entered the White House, America has taken a stake in at least 10 private companies, the federal government is now negotiating drug prices on TrumpRX, and the president now controls countless pots of foreign funds that have so far evaded congressional oversight.

While Trump has expanded his power within the private sector on congressional Republicans' watch, many powerful GOP members of Congress shrug off his repeated power plays.

“I haven't put much thought into it, to be honest with you,” Rep. Andy Harris (R-MD), who chairs the far-right Freedom Caucus, told Raw Story. “We've got other issues and I'm no expert in that, so I leave that to other people.”

“Doesn't it feel a little bit like socialism from the right, though?” Raw Story pressed.

“I don't know the specifics of the deals,” Harris said. “You know, in general, I'm not supportive, but I don't know enough about the specifics to make a comment.”

That’s laughable to many progressives who accuse congressional Republicans of giving Trump a pass as he remakes the GOP and federal government in his own image.

“He's using the words, you know, ‘socialism,’ ‘communism,’ ‘leftists’ as rhetoric against us,” Rep. Becca Balint (D-VT) told Raw Story. “And yet there are so many things happening in this administration that to any sober outside observer would be like, that actually smacks of socialism.”

“I haven't touched it”

Trump’s rhetoric is mirrored by congressional Republicans who regularly decry their Democratic counterparts on Capitol Hill for supporting measures in principle that fall far short of what this White House is doing in practice.

"It's an interesting paradox, especially when I sit in Budget or Judiciary Committee hearings and the biggest way that they go after us all the time is on 'socialism,' right?” Balint said. “But when your great leader does it they just roll over.”

And congressional Republicans have been rolling over a lot for Trump.

Besides now having a 9.9% stake in Intel after buying 433.3 million shares last August, the federal government’s also signed deals taking stakes in private nuclear development projects, an earth magnet startup in North Carolina, a rare earth mine in Texas, a minerals startup in Alaska and a lithium mine in Nevada.

“I have not been studying that at all,” Rep. Chuck Fleischmann (R-TN), who chairs the Appropriations Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development, told Raw Story. “I haven't touched it.”

Under Trump, the federal government also locked in a “golden share” in U.S. Steel. Even though America doesn’t have any direct monetary stake in the company, the president has veto power over some of its decisions, including if it wants to change its name or relocate.

And in July, the Pentagon bought $400 million in preferred stock of MP Materials with options to purchase more shares in the future, making the U.S. military the largest individual shareholder in America’s only commercial rare earth mine.

Nationalizing companies — the process in which a government takes control and ownership of private assets — is a fundamental cornerstone of socialist theory.

While congressional Republicans have heard some of the criticisms, few have bothered looking into the details.

“I understand the concerns it’s raised,” Sen. Mike Crapo (R-ID), who chairs the Senate Finance and Joint Taxation Committees, told Raw Story. “I'm not that engaged enough in it to register an opinion right now.”

“There's a downside to everything”

The GOP was never able to coalesce around a replacement of so-called Obamacare, but the president did slap his name on a new federal government prescription drug program, TrumpRX.

While Republicans decry the left for pushing government-run health care, Trump is leaning on drug manufacturers to get Most Favored Nation (MFN) pricing for an array of pharmaceuticals, ranging from migraine medications to weight loss drugs.

“Thanks to President Trump, the days of Big Pharma price-gouging are over,” the government’s website reads. “Leveraging the full weight and power of the United States of America, the President has ensured every American gets the lowest prices on prescription medications in the developed world.”

The program has garnered praise from at least one of the four Republican physicians in the U.S. Senate.

“Indeed, it is working,” Sen. Roger Marshall (R-KS) told Raw Story. “It's not perfect, it doesn't cover every drug, but people are seeing some significant savings.”

“Are you worried at all that if a Democrat takes over the White House, they could expand that, and this could become socialized medicine?" Raw Story pressed.

"Yeah, I think there's a downside to everything that the government does to get involved,” Marshall said. “But certainly the cost of prescription drugs is a huge concern for folks back home.”

But Democrats say the program is just window dressing.

“He's failed to deliver on lowering prices, and TrumpRX has higher prices than other places. So it's not a big win,” Sen. Peter Welch (D-VT) told Raw Story. “We need lower drug prices, and I'd work with President Trump to try to get lower prices. TrumpRX does not deliver lower prices."

Conservative critics outside of Congress blast TrumpRX for abandoning free market principles, including Advancing American Freedom (AAF), which was founded by Trump’s first-term running mate, former Vice President Mike Pence.

"If politicians in Washington start to place price controls on our most innovative products, like prescription drugs, we'll be handing over American jobs and life-saving research to China on a silver platter," says the narrator in a six-figure digital ad campaign AAF ran in the fall opposing TrumpRX.

But conservatives inside Congress have either been mum or supportive of Trump demanding a seat at the negotiating table for the federal government, even after the GOP’s made a bogeyman out of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) since he called for Medicare to negotiate drug prices on the national stage in the 2016 Democratic presidential primary.

Sanders has also called for indexing U.S. drug costs to the median price other nations pay, along with setting up a new federal agency to negotiate lower pharmaceutical costs.

While there are many similarities with TrumpRX, congressional Republicans say the big difference is between Sanders and Trump

“But remember, the difference is they want socialized medicine, so they want government funding all of that. Whereas Trump is fighting to keep a private system,” Sen. John Hoeven (R-ND) told Raw Story. “Bernie is fighting for socialism. We're fighting to keep a market-based system that gives people choice and where you have competition to try to keep costs down for people.”

"I don't think we've been given any information on that"

Then there are the “slush funds.”

Trump’s new Board of Peace has raised red flags on the libertarian right, like at the Cato Institute think tank, for establishing a fund controlled by the president.

While the Board of Peace is intended to rebuild Gaza, it offers permanent membership to countries that contribute $1 billion in cash to the fund within its first year, as opposed to a three-year appointment for other nations, which critics decry as another personal slush fund for Trump.

In negotiating new tariff rates with Japan, the Asian ally promised to create a $550 billion American investment fund controlled by Trump himself, with 90 percent of the profits going to the U.S. federal government.

Similarly, last month, South Korea agreed to a $350 billion investment in U.S. semiconductors and shipbuilding.

“There are so many things that are the way in which the Chinese operate, right?” Balint said. “It's just like it's all hidden money and it's moved around behind closed doors.”

When the U.S. military swooped in and captured Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, Trump announced America was taking control of the nation’s oil.

“This Oil will be sold at its Market Price, and that money will be controlled by me, as President of the United States of America, to ensure it is used to benefit the people of Venezuela and the United States!” Trump said on social media in January.

While Democrats have introduced bills demanding transparency and audits of those funds, they haven’t gotten assistance from their GOP counterparts.

"I don't think we've been given any information on that," Sen. Jack Reed (D-RI), the top Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee, told Raw Story. "We don't get a lot of information on anything, some of which is illegal.”

“The slippery slope we could end up on”

This is just another example of congressional Republicans falling in line, according to Democrats who say it’s been sad watching their Republican colleagues be driven by fear of President Trump throughout the entire 119th Congress.

“He's unleashed a policy of retribution and grievance, and they're more concerned with keeping their jobs than doing theirs,” Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-MA) told Raw Story. “They're not focused on future generations or being on the right side of history. They're just trying to keep a seat.”

While it’s unclear what the next Democrat to occupy the White House will do with all these federal programs Trump’s expanded, congressional Democrats aren’t ruling out expanding and revamping many of these programs in their party’s image.

“That's the slippery slope we could end up on,” Sen. Brian Schatz (D-HI) told Raw Story. “So I'm not sure how that ends."