Trump this week announced his TrumpRx website, which will provide discounted drugs from pharmaceutical companies to uninsured consumers from 2026, in addition to his deal with Pfizer Inc., under which the drug-making giant will charge U.S. consumers the same price they charge consumers in other wealthy, developed countries, even those whose governments set prices, a concept known as most-favored-nation pricing. 

Then two days later his administration announced that the Department of Energy would acquire a 5% equity stake in Lithium Americas, a Canadian company that is developing one of the world’s largest lithium mines in Nevada, as well as a 5% stake in its Thacker Pass lithium mining project in the same state with General Motors. The Lithium Americas deal was part of a renegotiated agreement regarding a $2.26 billion government loan.

Those stakes come after the Department of Commerce in August acquired a 10% stake in computer design and manufacturing company Intel as part of a deal including $10 billion in previously granted government funds and pledges following complaints about CEO Lip-Bu Tan. Earlier, the Department of Defense in July acquired a 15% stake in rare-earths miner MP Materials with $400 million in taxpayer dollars, and Japan’s Nippon Steel acquired U.S. Steel in July for $14.9 billion, but the government retained a non-economic “golden share.”

Trump also struck a deal in August with Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices for the government to receive 15% of the revenue the semiconductor companies raise from their sales of specific artificial intelligence chips to China, which were restricted in that market because of national security concerns, after the president, for example, publicly called on Coca-Cola in July to use cane sugar and not high-fructose corn syrup in its signature soda.

Trump has never had a “coherent ideology,” according to Claremont McKenna College politics professor John Pitney, a former Republican strategist.

“Aside from trade protectionism, he has flip-flopped on nearly every major issue,” Pitney told the Washington Examiner. “His political appeal is not about principle. It’s about resentment. Republicans support Trump because he gives voice to their dislikes and grievances. He is the heckler-in-chief.”

He added, “Trump can get away with attacking ‘socialists’ because the base does not associate the word with specific ideas. It’s just code for ‘people I loathe.’

Brookings Institution governance studies senior fellow Darrell West agreed that Trump is “getting more intrusive in company operations.” 

“The old idea that the government should keep its hands off businesses has given way to taking equity stakes in firms, demanding shares of company revenues, and intruding into personnel decisions,” West told the Washington Examiner. “It is an extraordinary level of intervention for a party that touts itself as wanting limited government.”

Regardless, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt praised Trump when asked whether it was appropriate to demand equity stakes or revenue streams from American companies.

“Well, look, this is a creative solution by the president of the United States to tackle our nation’s crippling debt crisis,” Leavitt told reporters this week. “As I said earlier, we are $37 trillion, trillion with a T, in debt… So the president is focused on how can the United States government make more money? How can we make our country wealthy and rich again? And cutting some of these unique, creative deals with companies around the world and here at home is just one way the president is seeking to do that.”

On the TrumpRX website, a senior Trump administration official underscored that “the government is not getting into the drug distribution business,” describing it instead as “a convening site” where the public can “access the lowest prices available through the president’s MFN initiative.”

“We aren’t getting into the business of determining who is the dispensing pharmacy, what is the method by which a particular drug should be dispensed,” the source told reporters this week. “We want that to be left up to consumer choice and manufacturers who are manufacturing these drugs.”

At the same time, Republicans have criticized Schumer for shutting down the government amid speculation that Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) is considering launching a primary challenge against him in 2028. 

Some Democrats condemned Schumer in March for voting to keep the government open the last time it needed funding. Six months later, Senate Republicans require at least eight Democrats in the chamber to end the shutdown because Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) will not support the continuing resolution spending measure.

Trump has blamed “Radical Left Democrats” for forcing Schumer to make unrealistic demands to keep the government open. He posted about Mamdani on Thursday, contending the “best thing that could happen to the Republican Party” is “A Communist Mayor in NYC.” 

“The Dems have gone stone cold CRAZY!” he wrote.

TRUMP, TROLLING DEMOCRATS, PROJECTS CONFIDENCE AS SHUTDOWN ENTERS SECOND DAY

The Republican National Committee amplified Trump’s message on Thursday, reminding reporters of Mamdani’s past support of defunding the police, abolishing prisons, giving taxpayer-funded benefits to illegal immigrants, and imposing socialist policies “like government-run grocery stores and converting private properties into communes.”

“The stakes couldn’t be higher,” RNC press secretary Kiersten Pels wrote.