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One of the myths in American history is that Abraham Lincoln, a poor man from Illinois, was an underdog who changed the world by sheer conviction. Lincoln might have grown up humbly, but he was far from poor when elected to the presidency. His estate would be worth over $2 million in 2024 dollars, placing him firmly in the top 10% of Americans by wealth.
Today, the wealth gap in politics remains stark. Donald Trump is the wealthiest person ever elected, surpassing the fortunes of George Washington and Thomas Jefferson by nearly tenfold. Among the wealthiest presidents since World War II, only two Republicans—Trump and George W. Bush—join Democrats Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, Lyndon B. Johnson, John F. Kennedy, and Franklin D. Roosevelt in the top fifteen. Across party lines, wealth is a constant in the election to the highest office in this country.
This election cost a record $15.9 billion, much of it lining the pockets of media corporations and, in some cases, the candidates themselves. According to The Guardian, Trump’s victory led the ten wealthiest people in the world to gain $64 billion collectively. Jeff Bezos, for instance, reportedly saw his wealth grow by $7 billion after the election.
Absolutely the reasons people vote for candidates like Trump are complex, layered, and sometimes contradictory, often rooted in frustrations or deeply ingrained biases. The intersection of race, gender, and anger over economic instability creates a potent mix that has fueled his base. For some, he represents a rejection of the political establishment and a voice for perceived injustices, even if his rhetoric exacerbates social divides.
At the same time, the wealth barrier remains a critical point. Wealth shapes who runs and who wins, often sidelining voices from working-class or diverse backgrounds in favor of candidates with deep corporate connections or personal fortunes. While Democrats traditionally positioned themselves as the “party of the people,” there’s undeniable truth to the claim that both major parties are now heavily influenced by wealth and corporate interests, sometimes blurring distinctions between them in the eyes of disillusioned voters.
This reality underscores how systemic barriers favor the elite—people who can fund their own campaigns or attract high-dollar donors. It skews the political process toward preserving the status quo and can alienate those who feel that neither party truly represents their interests, reinforcing cycles of frustration and populist backlash.
Real change won’t come from putting another wealthy Democrat against another wealthy Republican. We must challenge the status quo. Imagine the impact if we spent $15.9 billion on roads, schools, or healthcare instead of elections. Imagine redirecting the billions spent on political campaigns into projects that directly benefit people: upgrading infrastructure, funding public schools, expanding healthcare access. These are initiatives that could reshape communities, create jobs, and improve quality of life—investments that address the real needs of the country. These are also the exact things citizens have been fighting to achieve and that have brought immigrants to this nation.
The campaign financing arms race only serves to inflate the cost of entering politics, making it a game for the wealthy. Even promising candidates who start out with grassroots ideals often become beholden to the wealthy donors and corporate interests they rely on for support. This dependence inevitably impacts policy, diluting genuine attempts to tackle income inequality, healthcare access, and other urgent issues.
Real change will require a rethinking of the entire system, including how campaigns are funded. Public financing of campaigns, limits on private donations, and stringent regulations on dark money could go a long way in leveling the playing field. By minimizing wealth as a barrier to entry in politics, we could open up space for leaders who prioritize people over profits, challenge the status quo, and represent the full spectrum of American experiences. The question is, are we ready to demand this kind of transformation?
We need a powerful blueprint for change that could fundamentally reshape American politics to be more inclusive, equitable, and responsive to the needs of the everyday people who make up the fabric and soul of this nation. Here’s of some steps we could take that could help transform the political landscape:
Forming a Labor Party could bring about change in the realm of politics by offering disenchanted voters a distinct option. By concentrating on diminishing wealth disparity and emphasizing policies to the middle classes, a Labor Party could address matters frequently overlooked by the major political parties, such as stagnant wages, access, to healthcare, affordable housing and labor rights.
Nonpartisan elections could be a game-changer for reducing polarization and fostering a healthier, more issues-driven political culture. By removing party labels, candidates would be evaluated more on their specific policies, values, and records rather than party affiliation. Most of our local communities use leadership models already that are deliberately nonpartisan - forming city councils, school boards, and county commissions without pledging to support a national political party.
Overturning Citizens United would be a critical step in reclaiming democracy from corporate influence, bringing elections back to the people. The 2010 Citizens United ruling allowed unlimited political spending by corporations, unions, and other groups, effectively enabling the wealthy and corporate interests to dominate the political landscape. Since then, elections have increasingly been shaped by the interests of a small, powerful elite rather than the needs of ordinary voters. Again, there are many factors that explain the results of the past three election cycles, but Citizens United has led directly to a greater divide between elected leaders and those they represent.
Capping campaign spending at $10,000 per candidate (or some other mutually agreed upon amount) would be a revolutionary change in how elections are conducted, making politics more accessible to a wider range of candidates, particularly those without personal wealth or large donor backing. This move could dramatically reshape the political landscape by shifting the focus away from expensive, media-heavy campaigns and back toward issues, grassroots outreach, and authentic dialogue with voters.
Debate reform is an essential step toward creating a more inclusive and representative political system, and would become essential in a nonpartisan system. By holding a predetermined number of debates with the top candidates, we could ensure that voters are exposed to a wider range of perspectives, ideas, and policy proposals. This structure could also give more diverse and lesser-known candidates the chance to make their case to the American public, challenging the dominance of high-profile, establishment figures. Here’s why this reform would be transformative:
Ranked-Choice Voting (RCV) offers a transformative approach to elections by empowering voters to make their choices based on preference rather than fear of wasting their vote. This system, where voters rank candidates in order of preference, promotes more representative outcomes, reduces polarization, and encourages candidates to engage with a broader electorate. Many of our young people walked away from casting their first vote in 2024 feeling like they wasted their time. Ranked-choice voting might be a key to increasing and retaining voter turnout, because every vote would count and matter.
Eliminating the Electoral College and replacing it with a direct, popular vote is one of the most significant reforms that could be made to the U.S. election system. This change would ensure that each vote has equal weight, reflecting the true will of the people, and it would eliminate the distortion of outcomes that occurs when candidates focus disproportionately on a handful of swing states, like we have seen in 2016, 2020, and 2024. Some say that the 2024 election really came down to the voters in fewer than twelve counties in the nation - not states, counties. That means the will of the people is really the will of the minority under the current system.
Moreover, expanding the voting process to include U.S. territories and people who are incarcerated would make the system more inclusive, fairer, and more representative of the nation as a whole. Right now, we deny the vote to our territories, but allow it for those who move to one of the fifty U.S. states. We have decided that committing a crime (ie making a mistake in most cases) means you lose the rights of your citizenship until you pay the modern version of a poll tax. That means millions of citizens of the United States now live under a political system that endorses the exact policy we found a Revolution with the British government to stop - taxation without representation. All citizens, no matter where they live, deserve a vote.
If these reforms were implemented, politics could become a gateway to building a place where people’s needs are genuinely addressed, and candidates are accountable to their communities rather than wealthy donors. It would be a massive undertaking, but with enough support, it’s not beyond reach. The question is, how do we start pushing these ideas forward in a way that mobilizes the people and sustains momentum? In 2024, election reform initiatives like these lost nationally. United States citizens overwhelmingly claim to be unhappy with the current method our political system uses, but they also overwhelmingly reject change. "The status quo won this year,” said Deb Otis, director of research and policy at FairVote, a nonpartisan organization that advocates for ranked choice voting and other electoral reforms [in an article for NPR]. “The pro-democracy ballot measures, including anti-gerrymandering reform and open primary-only initiatives, tended to do worse than expected at the ballot.” Alaska, which added RCV just a few years ago, looks to have overturned it. Election reform loses when the candidates convince their supporters that the change will hurt them, when study after study demonstrates that it really only harms the lifelong politicians who reject it to cling to their own power.
“I think these initiatives were largely swept up in a highly polarized climate in which any suggestions of changing voter rules were met with suspicion among voters, and then that's amplified by the fact that you have both political parties and their aligned special interests fighting tooth and nail against these initiatives and planting doubt among voters,” says Nick Troiano — founding executive director of Unite America, a philanthropic venture fund that invests in nonpartisan electoral reform
Every day for the past twelve months, I’ve received texts and emails asking for political donations—maybe you have, too. We deserve leaders who come to us with a real vision for a thriving future, not just leaders who expect endless contributions to fuel their campaigns.
I am not suggesting this will be easy. But if we want to move toward a society like the one Captain Picard and the crew of the Enterprise inhabit—a world where equity, exploration, and shared purpose guide humanity—we must begin dismantling and rebuilding our systems, rather than just painting over the cracks.
This begins with restructuring our election system to move away from awarding leadership to the wealthiest among us. True leadership should be about vision and hope, not dollars. By creating a system where elected positions reflect purpose and the people’s interests rather than financial status, we take a real step toward that better world.
Lincoln once said, "Elections belong to the people. It's their decision. If they decide to turn their back on the fire and burn their behinds, then they will just have to sit on their blisters.” This year again, faced with the choice between business-as-usual Democrats and divisive Republicans, the wealthy have won and the rest of the country will be living with the blisters. It’s time to demand better.
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