Well Elon Musk Was Opposed To Scott Bessent
I guess we’ll soon see what MAGA thinks of Trump having named an openly gay, Soros-connected billionaire with a husband of 13 years and two adopted children who lives in Charleston’s iconic “Pink Palace” to run the Department of the Treasury. (He bought the mansion from the Ravenel family in 2016 for $6.5 million and is selling it for $22.25 million now.) Maybe they’ll just take it in stride. That would be a nice blow against homophobia. In any case, Wall Street is happy enough with the nomination. Monday morning markets were up on the news. Sam Sutton reported that after all the lunatics Trump picked for other positions— not just Gaetz, but Tulsi Gabbard, Pete Hegseth, RFK Jr, Dr. Oz, Linda McMahon, Russ Vought and Pam Bondi (just as bad as Gaetz but without the child rape charges)— “Trump’s choice of the 62-year-old hedge fund executive is being praised by Wall Street heavyweights who had hoped the president-elect would select a more traditional candidate for his administration’s most powerful economic post. While Bessent— once the chief investor at financier George Soros’ firm— has been a vocal proponent of Trump’s agenda, he’s also viewed as a realist who will understand how policy shifts might ripple across markets and the global economy.”
Aside from being denounced as a RINO by Elon Musk, who thought he would be able to push Trump into giving the job to Howard Lutnick, “Bessent’s selection followed a weekslong process that people close to the transition have compared to The Hunger Games or the CBS reality contest Survivor (a program that shares creative DNA with Trump’s own former show, The Apprentice, in the form of producer Mark Burnett). As contenders circulated through Mar-a-Lago for interviews with Trump and his advisers, rumors swirled about new alliances, whose stock was climbing, and how each candidate might adhere to Trump’s sprawling economic policy vision. The two-week fight over who would get the nod underscored the challenges Bessent will face if confirmed by the Senate next year.
Trump says he wants to generate “trillions” in revenue from new tariffs and to have “a say” in Federal Reserve interest rate decisions. He also wants to keep the stock market humming, crush inflation and impose massive cuts to both the budget and the federal workforce. Inevitably, his Treasury secretary will have to shoulder the conflicts and contradictions that arise from that agenda.
What’s more, Bessent will be competing for Trump’s attention at a White House that’s likely to be filled with economic policy advisers who hold starkly different views on trade, tax or fiscal policy. Trump’s transition co-chair Howard Lutnick— who the president-elect slotted to lead the Commerce Department— campaigned hard for the Treasury role and had the backing of Elon Musk, who’s now among Trump’s most vocal advisers. Musk posted on Twitter that Bessent would be a “business-as-usual choice.”
Bessent’s candidacy was also opposed by protectionist trade policy advocates who contended he wasn’t an aggressive enough adherent of Trump’s plan to impose universal tariffs. In a recent appearance on CNBC, Bessent said he would recommend that any new tariffs be “layered in gradually” to spread out their impact on prices, an approach that Trump himself has not publicly suggested. (Bessent also defended the use of tariffs in an op-ed on Fox News as the scramble over who would get Treasury intensified.)
But Wall Street’s comfort with Bessent stands in contrast to how industry reacted to Trump’s controversial selection of former Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz for attorney general until he withdrew or to former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard for Director of National Intelligence. One senior official in a previous administration described Bessent as “being in a different league” than some of other Trump picks, adding that “he’s a respected figure in the macro hedge fund community who has been a successful financial operator.”
“I’ve known Scott for almost 40 years, as he was my first professional hire at Chanos & Co.,” Jim Chanos, the famed short-seller, told POLITICO last week. “While we might disagree on politics, there is no questioning his character, patriotism and intellect. He would make an outstanding Treasury secretary.”
Still, Bessent remains something of an unknown to many in public policy circles, and his leadership and political skills would be severely tested since he’d be spearheading major battles next year over the fate of Trump’s tax cuts, the debt ceiling and potentially massive spending plans. So far, his financial industry credentials aren’t earning him any praise on the left.
“Wall Street may be breathing a sigh of relief at Scott Bessent’s nomination, but working people see no help coming their way,” Sen. Elizabeth Warren said in a statement. “Mr. Bessent’s expertise is helping rich investors make more money, not cutting costs for families squeezed by corporate profiteering.”
His middle name is Homer and his husband’s name is John Freeman. He studied political science at Yale and was treasurer of his class. His two children, a son and a daughter. have taken the name Bessent-Freeman. He was a major fundraiser for Democrats until recently. A strong advocate for LGBTQ rights and same-sex marriage, he supported Al Gore, John Kerry, Obama and Hillary but gave Trump’s inaugural committee a million dollars in 2017. Alan Rappaport wrote about his transition over the weekend.
Last spring, when many business leaders were hesitant to back Trump publicly as his legal troubles mounted, Bessent took a different view. He saw Trump as a “stock that goes up on bad news,” as he explained it to the political analyst Mark Halperin last month, because every apparent setback appeared to strengthen his candidacy.
Concerned about the exploding national debt and the need to make changes to the international trading system, Bessent set up a meeting with Trump and started exchanging economic policy ideas.
In recent months, Bessent has pitched a “3-3-3” plan that would aim for 3 percent economic growth, reduce the budget deficit to 3 percent of gross domestic product and increase domestic oil production by 3 million barrels per day. He also came up with an idea that would allow the president to essentially sideline the chair of the Federal Reserve, although he has backed down from that proposal in the face of opposition.
In some policy areas, Bessent has demonstrated an inclination to temper Trump’s economic impulses. He suggested that Trump’s idea of assigning a 15 percent tax rate to companies that produce their products in the U.S. could run afoul of international trade laws. And he has described Trump’s plan for blanket tariffs as a “maximalist” negotiating strategy, suggesting that tariffs should be phased in to give markets time to adjust.
Bessent was chosen after an internal tussle among Trump’s aides over the job. Howard Lutnick, Trump’s transition team co-chair and the chief executive of Cantor Fitzgerald, made a late pitch to secure the Treasury secretary role for himself.
As Trump was making his decision, skeptics of Bessent raised concerns about his ties to Soros and suggested that he was not a true believer in tariffs. However, he won the public support of key advisers to Trump such as Larry Kudlow and Stephen Bannon, who viewed him as the best choice.
The challenge now for Bessent will be remaining in Trump’s good graces as the president-elect once again looks to upend the international trading system and rewrite the tax code. Trump’s first Treasury secretary, Steven Mnuchin, often tried to dissuade Trump from imposing new tariffs and would attempt to calm markets as trade tensions flared. Still, he managed to maintain the trust of Trump.
Stanley Druckenmiller, a hedge fund investor who worked with Bessent at Soros Fund Management, said that while Bessent is soft-spoken, he can also be “tough and persuasive” and that has the right temperament to work for a demanding boss like Trump.
“If anybody can handle it, it’s Scott,” Druckenmiller said.
Erica Payne, president of Patriotic Millionaires, wasn’t as excited as the Wall Street banksters are about Bessent. She urged her members to oppose his confirmation, noting that as the founder ofKey Square Capital Management, he’s “had years of inconsistent returns that has resulted in a 90% decline in his hedge funds’ assets. But he won his biggest bet yet when he gambled on Donald Trump winning a second term, and it paid off extraordinarily. If confirmed, Bessent would lead the agency in charge of funding and paying bills of the federal government, and ensuring payments of Social Security and Veteran Benefits. The problem? Bessent has gone on record calling for deregulating the economy. The deregulation Bessent has in mind won't grow the economy or create jobs, it'll just make him, Trump, and their billionaire friends even wealthier. With Bessent leading the Treasury Department, the inequity in our economy will continue to grow at staggering levels. Bessent's personal and corporate donations during the 2024 election were an investment in killing regulations of the financial industry, protecting the carried-interest loophole, and putting himself in a position of power close to Donald Trump. The carried interest loophole allows private equity and hedge fund managers to claim large portions of their income as investment gains— which allows them to pay a lower tax rate than nurses, teachers, and sanitation workers. It is the epitome of everything that is wrong with our tax code, and Scott Bessent has benefited greatly from it.”