U.S. President Donald Trump prepares to board Air Force One to return to Washington at the end of his New Year holiday, at Palm Beach International Airport in Palm Beach, Florida, U.S., January 4, 2026. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst
Since returning to the White House, President Donald Trump has imposed an array of new rules on federal government agencies that Democratic opponents consider heavy-handed. But Trump, critics say, is also taking a heavy-handed approach with private-sector businesses.
In a detailed opinion column/essay published on January 6, the New York Times' Thomas B. Edsall stresses that Trump's "domineering tactics also extend deep into the private sector."
"Trump and his allies are applying a financial and regulatory chokehold on an array of corporations, institutions and special interest groups that he is convinced are aligned with the Democratic Party and the left against him," Edsall warns. "Trump's assault cuts a wide swath, from electric cars and wind energy projects to service-providing nonprofits and television networks…. Trump’s extensive intrusions into the private-sector conflict with the traditional conservative belief that government should limit its interference with the free market as much as possible."
For his column, Edsall interviewed political science experts at major universities — who expressed their worries about what they sees as the Trump Administration's efforts to micromanage the private sector.
Shari Berman, a political scientist at Barnard College in New York City, told Edsall, "Trump has been strikingly successful in weakening nongovernmental constraints on executive power. Media organizations, major corporations, law firms, universities and civil society groups have all come under sustained pressure. Taken together, these developments represent a significant consolidation of executive authority beyond formal governmental boundaries."
Matthew Dallek, a political historian at George Washington University in Washington, D.C., argues that companies are capitulating to Trump out of fear.
Dallek told Edsall, "Social media companies have lifted bans on far-right hatemongers and made X and Facebook more hospitable to pro-MAGA content. Universities such as Columbia, law firms like Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher and Flom and media institutions like ABC News have reached settlements with the Trump Administration to stave off existential threats, including canceled licenses, loss of research funding and revoked security clearances."
Kim Lane Scheppele, a sociology professor at Princeton University in New Jersey, believes that Trump has been relentless in bullying non-governmental agencies (NGOs) and nonprofits.
Scheppele told Edsall, "The entire nongovernment community…. has been threatened with a combination of loss of tax exemptions, cuts to federal funding and potential investigations. Some statistics indicate that fully one-third of NGOs incorporated in the U.S. lost funding in the first half of 2025…. NGOs are nervous — and some are pulling back from some of the causes that they know this administration does not support. Some NGOs have created 'sister organizations' in other countries to shield resources from U.S. coercive measures (vindictive lawsuits, sudden tax-status changes) and provide an escape route if necessary."
Thomas B. Edsall's full New York Times column/essay is available at this link (subscription required).