The CBS News documentary “Is America in a New Gilded Age? Wealth, Power and Democracy” is nothing more than a thinly veiled hit piece against President Donald Trump and the business leaders who support him, while conveniently ignoring the left-wing billionaires who have spent fortunes manipulating U.S. politics. The documentary, which aired on June 28, 2025, parroted the same tired rhetoric from far-left figures like Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and former Clinton lackey Robert Reich, painting conservative-leaning titans like Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and Mark Zuckerberg as threats to democracy. Yet, CBS deliberately omitted the most egregious examples of billionaire influence—those bankrolling the radical left’s agenda.
CBS senior business and technology correspondent Jo Ling Kent, who spearheaded the documentary, admitted her work was inspired by President Joe Biden’s fearmongering about a rising “oligarchy.” But her selective outrage tells the real story. While she and her leftist guests railed against Musk’s acquisition of X (formerly Twitter) and Bezos’s ownership of The Washington Post, they remained silent about the billionaires who have spent decades reshaping American politics in favor of progressive extremism.
Where’s the Outrage Over Soros, Bloomberg, and Hoffman?
George Soros, the far-left megadonor, has funneled $32 billion into his Open Society Foundations to push open borders, radical climate policies, and soft-on-crime prosecutors. His son, Alex Soros, now wields the same unchecked influence, boasting about his access to world leaders, including Biden. Yet Kent’s documentary didn’t utter a word about them.
Then there’s Michael Bloomberg, who dropped $1 billion trying to buy the 2020 election and pledged another billion to destroy the U.S. coal industry. In 2024, he spent $47 million to elect Kamala Harris and keep Democrats in power. Reid Hoffman, the unhinged LinkedIn co-founder, bankrolled the politically motivated E. Jean Carroll lawsuit against Trump while funneling millions into Harris’s campaign. These billionaires weren’t just ignored—they were protected by CBS.
Kent even cited leftist author Andrea Bernstein, who whined, “What are you going to do if you’re wealthy and you have a lot of money? You’re going to put some of that into the political system to try to influence outcomes so that you can hang on to even more money.” The irony is staggering. While CBS hyperventilates over conservative billionaires, the left’s donor class operates with impunity.
The Real Oligarchs: BlackRock, Vanguard, and State Street
Kent’s documentary also ignored the $26 trillion asset management giants—BlackRock, Vanguard, and State Street—who dominate corporate media ownership, including CBS’s parent company, Paramount Global. These firms push woke ESG policies that align with the left’s agenda, yet Kent had no interest in exposing their stranglehold on democracy.
Wall Street Journal columnist Jason Riley called out the hypocrisy: “Are people on the left complaining that other wealthy individuals decide to spend their money on electing people who want to go soft on criminals that are raising hell in low-income communities?” He added, “If you’re spending your money a certain way, you’re okay. If you’re spending it on free market ideas and principles—if you want lower taxes, if you want smaller government and so forth—somehow you are villainous.”
The documentary’s bias was glaring. Kent interviewed eight left-wing critics of Trump-aligned billionaires but only four voices defending free-market principles. Even Dartmouth professor Brooke Harrington was given a platform to smear Musk and Bezos as “broligarchs” while giving Soros and Bloomberg a free pass.
The Liberal Media’s Double Standard
CBS’s refusal to hold leftist billionaires accountable proves this was never about “oligarchy”—it was about silencing dissent. President Trump has long been a target of the corporate media precisely because he challenges their power. Meanwhile, the same outlets remain silent as left-wing elites buy elections, manipulate justice, and impose radical policies on everyday Americans.