January 30, 2026
Ms. Tlaib (for herself, Ms. Jayapal, Mrs. Ramirez, and Ms. Lee of Pennsylvania) submitted the following resolution; which was referred to the Committee on the Judiciary, and in addition to the Committees on House Administration, Ways and Means, Education and Workforce, Energy and Commerce, Financial Services, and Agriculture, for a period to be subsequently determined by the Speaker, in each case for consideration of such provisions as fall within the jurisdiction of the committee concerned
Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives that the United States must act urgently to end the political and economic dominance of billionaire oligarchs, halt the corporate subsidies and tax advantages that fortify their power, and reinvest in the needs of the American people to defend democracy from authoritarianism.
Whereas the United States was created to be a democracy, founded on the principle that all people are created equal, governed not by kings or corporate masters but by themselves as free citizens;
Whereas the people of the United States understand that the gravest threat to democracy and individual freedoms is the alliance of private wealth and authoritarian government;
Whereas the people of the United States have sounded the alarm and struggled to prevent democracy from being ruled by oligarchs over the course of the 250 years since the founding of the United States;
Whereas, through United States history, the Federal Government has vigorously combated excessive concentrations of power and wealth by breaking up monopolies, rooting out government corruption and cronyism, taxing high incomes and large estates, and enacting rules to prevent the powerful from exploiting workers and the environment;
Whereas, over the past 50 years, the Federal Government has forfeited its role safeguarding democracy by allowing the wealthy to amass outsized economic and political power leading to skyrocketing income and wealth inequality;
Whereas today, with the combined wealth of America’s 900 billionaires now exceeding that of the 67,000,000 households in the poorest 50 percent, wages for working people have stagnated and basic needs, including housing and health care, have become unaffordable;
Whereas President Donald Trump and ultrawealthy oligarchs and corporations are corrupting United States politics through billions in open and hidden campaign contributions and by exploiting their monopoly control in key sectors of the economy, and especially over media, information, and emerging digital technologies;
Whereas President Trump has permitted pay-to-play schemes to become endemic, as oligarchs leverage political contributions to win hundreds of billions in taxpayer-funded Federal subsidies, tax breaks, regulatory rollbacks, and government contracts despite exploiting workers and polluting communities;
Whereas the oil and gas industry spent over $400,000,000 on lobbying, campaign contributions, and media buys in the 2024 election cycle and in return has received at least $144,000,000,000 in tax breaks, the end of Federal support for renewables, and a green light to complete the destruction of the climate;
Whereas Big Tech spent almost $400,000,000 in support of President Trump, who in return is recklessly promoting unrestricted development of artificial intelligence, which has enriched tech owners and investors by trillions of dollars, while jeopardizing jobs, the environment, and public health;
Whereas the crypto industry leveraged more than $274,000,000 in corporate contributions during the 2024 electoral cycle to win industry-friendly legislation, regulatory rollbacks, political pardons, and dropped charges, facilitating new channels for corruption via meme coins and stablecoins, which President Trump has already utilized to increase his family’s net worth by billions of dollars;
Whereas President Trump is wielding autocratic power to enrich his oligarchic backers and accelerate the transfer of wealth to corporations and billionaires, including by enacting massive tax cuts for the rich while slashing benefits for the poor;
Whereas the quid pro quo between President Trump and the oligarchs corrupts the Federal Government, erodes democracy, undermines citizen freedom by deepening economic inequality, and blocks popular action on urgent crises such as climate change, affordable health care, and workers’ rights;
Whereas public funds belong to the people of the United States and should be invested in education, health care, housing, clean energy, and infrastructure, not used to enrich the wealthiest individuals and most powerful corporations;
Whereas the Supreme Court is complicit in deconstructing American democracy by interpreting money as speech, and misusing the Constitution as an instrument for entrenching oligarchic power over the government, the economy, and working people;
Whereas the labor movement has played a significant historical role in counteracting corporate power, reducing inequality, and ensuring the political system is responsive to the interests of ordinary Americans, not just wealthy elites;
Whereas the long-term decline in the percentage of workers who are union members has diminished the ability of the labor movement to play this crucial role;
Whereas control of economic resources grants political power, from command over the workplace or investment decisions, to the ability to set the political agenda and influence public policy;
Whereas concentrated economic power is inconsistent with the core democratic value of political equality;
Whereas a truly democratic society requires a democratic economy, where power derived from ownership and control over economic resources is widely distributed and democratically accountable; and
Whereas the people of the United States demand bold action to end oligarchic power and achieve real democracy: Now, therefore, be it
Sec.
That it is the sense of the House of Representatives that—
(1)
the Federal Government must act to defund the oligarchs in order to defend American democracy and safeguard individual liberties;
(2)
the President must not reward oligarchs and billionaire-controlled corporations with lucrative, publicly funded contracts, loans, and grants if they—
(A)
engage in corrupt political quid pro quo schemes;
(B)
fail to fairly compete in open markets; and
(C)
break Federal labor, environmental, and nondiscrimination laws;
(3)
the President and Congress must act with all deliberate speed to protect election integrity by stopping billionaire and corporate spending from drowning out the voices and votes of working people, and ensuring all elections are publicly financed with small dollar contributions;
(4)
the President and Congress must break up all concentrations of economic and political power, especially monopolies in traditional and new media, finance, and tech sectors, and act to ensure critical national security functions including cloud computing, surveillance, artificial intelligence, and space exploration are controlled by public servants, not oligarchs;
(5)
the President and Congress must drastically reduce levels of economic inequality and concentrations of inherited wealth by increasing tax rates for corporations and the ultrarich, enacting a wealth tax, and closing legal loopholes the wealthy use to evade paying their fair share, and that revenues from such measures should be directed toward universal health care, affordable housing, debt-free education, and climate resilience;
(6)
the President and Congress must reform the Supreme Court to ensure that a majority of Justices recognize the Constitution as enabling Congress to take the urgent actions necessary to save democracy from corporate control, not as a bill of rights for oligarchs;
(7)
the President and Congress must support the dramatic expansion of unions in order to curtail corporate power, ensure ordinary Americans benefit from economic growth, and provide an institutional basis for working people to make collective demands on the political system, countering elite dominance;
(8)
the President and Congress must explore ways to promote alternative, noncorporate forms of ownership, such as cooperative, nonprofit, multistakeholder, and public or community ownership, which can displace corporate power and form the building blocks of a democratic economy; and
(9)
the President and Congress must use public money to fund programs that raise the standard of living by providing affordable health care, housing, food, and education, so that the people of the United States have what they need to survive and thrive.