There has been a lot of talk of isms these days. President Trump, known for his transactional approach to everything, suddenly became an ideologue. In his effort to help Republicans in the midterms, he conjured up another Red Scare by calling the newly rising Democratic Socialists “communists.”
In his Mount Rushmore speech for the 250th anniversary of American independence, Trump told the audience, “Communism is a mortal threat to American liberty. It is the greatest threat to our country.” Jumbling history, he included “World War I, World War II, Pearl Harbor or even 9/11.” He probably could use a reminder that Russia and China, the two post-war communist powers, were on the same side as the U.S. in World War II. When communism did pose a great threat to America, it was during the Cold War.
In reality, Trump loves a communist, Chinese Communist Party chief Xi Jinping, in particular. As Trump once said, “I love China… I respect China greatly. I very much respect President Xi. Xi’s for China, I’m for the US, but other than that we love each other.” In Beijing in May, Trump told Xi, “It’s an honor to be with you, it’s an honor to be your friend.”
He not only admires Xi, Trump also imitates what Xi Jinping and the CCP do in terms of state capitalism or state ownership of enterprises. Since January 2025, according to Council on Foreign Relations, the Trump administration has announced 37 deals worth $27.6 billion of investments with direct ownership of private companies. Among the agencies doing deals are the Departments of Commerce, Development Finance Corporation, Defense, and Energy. Dels span aviation, critical minerals, defense, energy, health care, industrial metals, natural resources, quantum technology, and semiconductors. Prominent deals include 10 percent equity in Intel, golden shares in U.S. Steel/Nippon Steel, and $400 million in equity in MP Materials. The Wall Street Journal sounded the alarm in a headline: “The U.S. Marches Toward State Capitalism With American Characteristics.”
Trump may or may not know that China for a long time had a “Capitalist Scare.” Anything antithetical to socialism, like private ownership, business profit, was taboo, frowned upon, criticized. Those showing any preference for market or contract systems were labeled “capitalist roaders” and severely attacked and persecuted.
China got over that. The CCP embraced market capitalism, its once-foresworn counter-system, to grow China’s economy. It was a hard, pragmatic and successful turn by the CCP.
Trump might love China or Xi Jinping even more if he knew how CCP came around to market capitalism and made China the economic and technological powerhouse it is today. It is the party’s practice of pragmatism rather than communist ideology.
After decades of bitter class struggle over socialism vs capitalism, the late Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping gave the Chinese people his most iconic motto of pragmatism for China’s era of reform, “It doesn’t matter if a cat is black or white, it is a good cat if it catches mice.” The saying originated from a proverb of Deng’s home province Sichuan. Similarly, Deng also said that economic development was the absolute principle and a measure of the reform.
In the spirit of Deng’s “cat theory,” China opened special economic zones in the 1980s to experiment with a market economy and introduce foreign capital, technology, and management. With their great success, the market economy was adopted all over China, leading to its current hybrid economy with diverse ownership all under a communist party.
America, on the other hand, is the land of the free, where Americans enjoy freedom of speech and freedom to form or choose political parties. Besides the Democrats and the Republicans, there is a long list of other parties including the Green Party, Libertarian Party, Constitution Party, American Solidarity Party, and yes, the Democratic Socialists of America, Socialist Party USA, Communist Party USA, American Communist Party, as well as No Labels, Forward Party, and more.
Democracy is a marketplace of ideas and political parties. There are so many problems facing Americans today: from a K-shaped economy to a sense the American dream is slipping away, especially for the young; from AI challenges in the job market to an expensive new foreign war, from persistent gun violence to a growing homeless population. It may be a good idea for our political parties, Democrats or Democratic Socialists, Republicans or Never Trumpers, to be a little less ideological or dogmatic, and a little more pragmatic and responsive to voters. If it takes a different idea or a different approach, it shouldn’t be scary in this land of the brave.
As Deng’s “black cat, white cat” saying goes, it is not the color of the cat but catching the mice that is important.
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