President Donald Trump and Donald Trump Jr. walk on the South Lawn upon their arrival to the White House, Sunday, May 3, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana) Though President Trump’s approval rating hovers at around 37 percent, Democrats still need a solid message apart from “we’re not Trump” if happy days are to be here again. Just wait until we nominate a candidate, they say, then we will have one.
One issue that voters can rally round is the wanton corruption in Washington. Last year was a financial bonanza for Trump, bringing in over $2 billion — more than half of which came from crypto, even as his administration gutted the industry’s primary regulator.
Trump’s son, Donald Trump Jr. is a director of a company called GrabAGun. Called the “Amazon of guns,” GrabAGun handles ammunition and gun accessories, selling directly online. The administration has proposed regulatory changes that would dramatically benefit the company. A White House official said the new rules were “driven by the administration’s interest in protecting the Second Amendment,” and were unrelated to Trump Jr.’s business interests.
The pièce de résistance is 1789 Capital, which profanes the year of the U.S. Constitution. 1789 Capital — run by Trump Jr. and his partner, Omeed Malik — has made investments in artificial intelligence and defense technology that have tripled in value in just one month.
Many of these investments have been in companies seeking large government contracts. Others “have benefited directly from new Trump policies or rollbacks of existing laws.”
One of the investments is Polymarket, a prediction market betting site with fortunes hinging directly on government policies. It was worth $300 million when 1789 Capital invested in it. Earlier last year, Polymarket was granted a U.S. operating license. Today, “the platform is now valued at $15 billion.”
Tell me this is not corruption.
Politics under Trump is a business, not an ideology. Malik, the younger Donald’s partner, is an apostate Democrat who, on Wall Street, had been an active fundraiser for Democratic candidates, including Hillary Clinton and Joe Kennedy III.
Trump Jr. and Malik openly revel in their connections to big MAGA donors and senior officials, but they reject suggestions that their extraordinary success comes from the relationship itself. Trump Jr. told the New York Times that his approach to the investments he has worked on during his father’s second term is, “F— all you guys.”
“Just two years ago, 1789 managed a few hundred million dollars,” reports the Times. “It now oversees more than $3 billion. Its main investment fund generated returns of roughly 200 percent as of June 30.” Those figures “eclipse the average returns of about 21 percent from venture capital firms started in 2023, according to PitchBook, a provider of financial data.”
Trump Jr. said, as a private citizen, he is free to invest however he wants and is doing nothing illegal. He said he talks to his father only “every few weeks,” and never discusses business with him. If you believe that one, I have a bridge in Brooklyn I would be happy to sell you.
Malik is fond of saying he has never even “set foot in the White House.” But did anyone bother to ask him about texts, phone calls and emails?
And then there is Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law, who had been involved in negotiations with Iran while his private investment firm solicited funds from Arab countries in the Middle East. Kushner later said the firm would not seek additional money from the region while he was volunteering for the government.
1789 Capital has fueled a wide range of companies, many benefiting from Trump administration policies. Vulcan Elements, a company specializing in rare earths magnets, was valued at around $200 million before 1789’s investment last fall. Shortly after the investment, Vulcan Elements landed a $620 million loan from the Department of Defense and is now valued at around $2 billion.
The Times also reported that the chief executive of the 3D printing company VulcanForms repeatedly bragged about 1789’s investment, implying that its political connections “could help bring about opportunities for the start-up.” Malik said “he couldn’t police what companies he invested in said about the firm.”
Last year, 1789 Capital invested in Reflection AI, a builder of open-source systems for artificial intelligence models. The first investment was in the summer of 2025, when the company was valued at $3.5 billion. For one of Reflection AI’s first customers, Malik obtained the South Korean conglomerate Shinsegae Group: an investor in 1789 Capital.
In March, Reflection AI and Shinsegae announced they would build a multibillion-dollar data center in South Korea. With a current $25 billion valuation, Reflection AI has appreciated sevenfold in a year.
In 1953, Secretary of Defense and former General Motors President Charles Wilson was asked if he could make decisions as a public official that go against the company’s interest. He said that he could, but for years, he “thought what was good for our country was good for General Motors, and vice versa.”
This past spring, 1789 Capital hosted a webinar for Reflection AI’s executive team and potential investors. Channeling Wilson in a prerecorded video, Trump Jr. described Reflection AI as “good for America.”
Is not corruption the horse for the Democrats to ride back into town?
James D. Zirin is a former federal prosecutor in the Southern District of New York and a published legal analyst.
Add as preferred source on Google Tags 1789 Capital Charles Wilson crypto democrats Department of Defense Donald Trump Donald Trump Jr. GrabAGun Hillary Clinton Jared Kushner Joe Kennedy III MAGA Omeed Malik Omeed Malik polymarket Reflection AI trump Trump administration Trump crypto trump family Trump financial disclosures Vulcan Elements VulcanForms Washington white houseCopyright 2026 Nexstar Media Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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