The Price of Power: Donald Trump and the Tech Broligarchs | Pivot

1. KSKara Swisher0:00

   ... ABC News has agreed to pay $15 million to settle a defamation lawsuit brought by Donald Trump. The suit's centered around comments that ABC's George Stephanopoulos made against a c- uh, in a civil suit against Trump, brought by E. Jean Carroll. He said he was found liable for rape when he actually had been found liable for sexually assaulting and defaming Carroll. Uh, the judge had- had- had mentioned that it was in most terms that would be considered that, and that's, I think, why he said it. Um, but in fact, the- the- the jury had found him liable for, uh, sexual ass- assault, uh, and d- defamation. Under the terms of the settlement, ABC News will donate, uh, uh, the money, $15 million, uh, to a future presidential foundation and museum. And Stephanopoulos and ABC also- also issued a statement of regret for the mistake. Um, uh, many experts thought... I- I've talked to a dozen lawyers. They thought ABC would have won, uh, and Trump is... typically does this a lot, as a, as a... and so does... speaking of Elon Musk, we just talked about him. They use legal, uh, threats as a means of- of- of, uh, having people, uh, acquiesce. So, t- talk a little bit about this. I mean, from a business point of view, again, it's using censorship. It's using l- legal means. It's using anything but actual competition, or just like things work out.

2. PKPaul Krugman1:13

   And it's more than that. What we're seeing is that... I mean, some of us had warned that, um, that, uh, a Trump admi- second Trump administration would be one in which the, uh, coercive power of the government, uh, against business would become huge. That it... I mean, we're in a- a mixed economy where the government plays a big role, uh, private sector plays a big role. Uh, lots of things in the private sector depend upon government decisions that are reasonably favorable. Um, as long as you have rules, norms, rule of law, um, then that kind of works okay. But if you start to have arbitrary exercise, and then... One of the things we worry about on, on tariffs, um, it happens to be the case that the way that our trade laws are written, the president has enormous discretion in tariff setting. And in some ways, one of the worst things about Trump tariffs will be not the tariffs he applies, but the ones he doesn't, because he can play favorites with who gets to get exempted from a tariff. There is some evidence he did that even on the relatively small tariffs he imposed in the first term. So, if you're ABC and you're looking at, uh, at all the ways that Trump can hurt you if he wants to, uh, then you, you know, pay protection money. That's what just happened. And this is a much bigger thing than just competition. This is basically, um, big business already acknowledging that we've become a, uh, uh, a- a protection racket country.

3. KSKara Swisher2:45

   Pay for play. Pay for play, or just-

4. PKPaul Krugman2:46

   Yeah. And, uh, that's- that's scarier than anything. I mean, it's, uh... it- that's, uh, uh... it's one of those reasons to wonder whether, you know, uh, 2024 was maybe the last real election.

5. KSKara Swisher2:58

   So talk a little bit about it, because b- from a business, from an economy point of view, you can have a very robust economy even with this cooperation, or does it ultimately end, this oligarchy, and in lack of innovation, which has been the hallmark of the US really? Um...

6. PKPaul Krugman3:14

   Yeah.

7. KSKara Swisher3:14

   ... dominance and innovation and new, fresh ideas. We... it's really been a remarkable run for the United States over the last 40 years.

8. PKPaul Krugman3:20

   Yeah. We've had an extraordinary... particularly the last 25 years.

9. KSKara Swisher3:23

   Yeah.

10. PKPaul Krugman3:24

    You know, the, uh... in 2000, roughly all advanced countries seem to be about on the same level technologically. The US has now pulled well ahead, um, and there are... uh, one of the pieces I've written recently says a lot of that is actually just geography.

11. KSKara Swisher3:38

    Mm-hmm.

12. PKPaul Krugman3:38

    There's probably room for only one Silicon Valley anywhere in the world-

13. KSKara Swisher3:41

    Right.

14. PKPaul Krugman3:41

    ... and it happens to be here. But the, um... but, uh, a lot of it is also, yeah, openness, uh, rule of law, uh, success depends upon actually producing stuff that people want and can use, um, uh, being able to attract the s- best and brightest from around the world to work. And all of that is at risk. We're, uh, in a situation where, uh, you know, we know that there are people with influence on Trump who- who think of tech jobs as being goodies to be handed out, and don't... not... don't let foreigners have those.

15. KSKara Swisher4:17

    Mm-hmm.

16. PKPaul Krugman4:17

    Um, we know that, uh, we're... may well be heading for a situation in which, um, c- uh, in which success in business depends upon pull with the administration, depends on-

17. KSKara Swisher4:29

    Right. Proximity.

18. PKPaul Krugman4:29

    ... on whether you're in or out of favor.

19. KSKara Swisher4:31

    Right.

20. PKPaul Krugman4:31

    Um, and we even have, I mean, uh, for what it's worth, uh, regimes like that, according to an IMF meta-study, um, it subtracts about 1% from growth, year after year, indefinitely.

21. KSKara Swisher4:44

    Year after year. How do you look at... with all these billionaires around him? And they certainly are, just one... i- it's mostly tech that's going there, but Disney-

22. PKPaul Krugman4:51

    Yeah.

23. KSKara Swisher4:51

    ... just did this, right?

24. PKPaul Krugman4:52

    Mm-hmm.

25. KSKara Swisher4:52

    This is Bob- Bob Iger doing this, uh, making... he- he'd had to approve of the settlement, and, uh, he is not... you haven't seen him at Mar-a-Lago but this is his version of that, right?

26. PKPaul Krugman5:01

    Yeah.

27. KSKara Swisher5:02

    Um, h- what is that... wh- what... were you surprised that it's been the tech people who had mostly stayed out of government, right? Until they realized there was... there was an in- interview that Marc Andreessen did, who I've known for a long time, uh, kind of largely a despicable character, but, um, uh, one of the things he said, he was terrified by what Biden was gonna do and he was scared and that's what drove him into Trump's arm, which I think is...

28. PKPaul Krugman5:25

    Absolute insanity.

29. KSKara Swisher5:26

    ... uh, unlikely-

30. PKPaul Krugman5:26

    No, I...

Episode duration: 10:36