A persistent fiction continues to capture the imagination of a significant segment of the American public — the notion that Donald Trump is, or ever was, an “anti-establishment” figure. It is a narrative so easily disproven by evidence and logic that one must ask why it persists, and who benefits from its propagation.
Let’s begin with a simple observation: a billionaire real estate developer, raised in privilege, funded by inherited wealth, whose entire business career depended on favorable treatment from banks, deregulated markets, political influence, and media spectacle — is, by definition, not “anti-establishment.” He is the establishment. More precisely, he is its caricature — a distilled embodiment of everything the corporate, political, and media elite have normalized over the past 40 years.
It’s true that Trump speaks in a style alien to elite norms. He mocks the rituals of official power, trades in crude slogans, and channels public anger into performances that feel subversive but leave power untouched.
In reality, Trump has cut taxes for the rich, slashed regulations for fossil fuel companies and Wall Street, filled cabinets and advisory posts with corporate lobbyists and industry insiders, appointed ultra-conservative judges handpicked by the Federalist Society, and offered unwavering support for the most repressive elements of U.S. policing and military power. His foreign policy — despite occasional bursts of nationalist posturing — has been a continuation of empire by other means: expanded drone warfare, support for Israeli apartheid, and efforts to orchestrate coups in Venezuela and Iran.
This is not a departure from the establishment agenda. It is the agenda.
The illusion that Trump threatens elite power persists in part because people have confused his violation of liberal norms with actual opposition to corporate and imperial structures. But those structures — private control of capital, militarized borders, mass surveillance, unaccountable campaign finance, and an extractive, debt-driven economy — have not only remained intact under Trump’s leadership but have been systematically fortified.
Let us be clear: an “anti-establishment” politics would challenge the concentration of wealth and power, resist the capture of democracy by corporate interests, expand civil rights, and work toward demilitarization and ecological sustainability. Trump has done the opposite on every count. He has attacked voting rights, fed our bloated military budget, handed public lands over to private industry, gutted environmental regulations, and given the Heritage Foundation free reign to enact their Project 2025 agenda.
A related fiction, equally dangerous, is the idea that criticism of Trump means aligning yourself with the establishment — as if opposing fascistic nationalism means supporting neoliberal centrism by default. This is a false dichotomy. The choice is not between corporate Democrats and authoritarian populists. In fact, that is precisely the kind of binary the establishment relies on to keep genuine alternatives off the table.
Meaningful dissent does not flow from loyalty to parties or personalities. It comes from moral clarity and political vision. One can — and must — critique the failures of the Democratic Party, the corruption of mainstream media, and the complicity of centrist technocrats while opposing the authoritarian right. In fact, the only coherent opposition to Trumpism requires rejecting the entire system that allowed it to emerge in the first place.
Trump’s greatest contribution to the establishment has never been disruption — it is normalization. He makes plutocracy feel populist. He makes cruelty feel like candor. He gives the most regressive elements of American life a new aesthetic — one that speaks the language of grievance while protecting the mechanisms of exploitation. In this sense, Trump didn’t break the system. He updated its software.
To the extent that segments of the population continue to view him as a rebel, it reflects a deep alienation from a system that has failed millions — economically, culturally, and spiritually. That alienation is real. The pain is real. But the diagnosis is wrong. Trump hasn’t opposed the forces that created this pain. He’s fed off it.
The dangerous fantasy of Trump as an outsider serves a critical function: it distracts from systemic critique. It turns justified anger into tribal theater. And it lets the real architects of suffering — from the boardrooms of BlackRock to the backrooms of Congress — continue their work, unnoticed and unopposed.
If we are serious about dismantling the establishment, we must look beyond its symptoms. We must build movements that are rooted in solidarity among each other, not the spectacle of politicians. And we must stop mistaking demagogues for revolutionaries, when they are still just vessels for corporate and imperial power.
Whether politicians rely on an "anti-woke" aesthetic or a centrist liberal aesthetic, we have to start looking deeper, at the structures and systems both corporate parties serve, and demand more.
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