Podcast / The Time of Monsters / May 4, 2025

The Secret Clubhouse for Reactionary Plutocrats

On this episode of The Time of Monsters, Chris Lehmann on the group chats where billionaires scheme and moan.

The Nation Podcasts
The Nation Podcasts

Here's where to find podcasts from The Nation. Political talk without the boring parts, featuring the writers, activists and artists who shape the news, from a progressive perspective.

The Secret Clubhouse for Reactionary Plutocrat | The Time of Monsters with Jeet Heer
byThe Nation Magazine

On this episode of The Time of Monsters, Chris Lehmann joins Jeet Heer to discuss the Group Chats where billionaires scheme and moan.

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Entrepreneur Marc Andreessen speaks onstage during TechCrunch Disrupt SF 2016, at Pier 48 on September 13, 2016.

(Steve Jennings / Getty Images for TechCrunch)

Silicon Valley has moved to the right in the last few years, with Elon Musk being the public face of a larger trend of tech lords aligning themselves with Trumpism. We now have a window into just how reactionary Silicon Valley has become thanks to reporting about private group chats where the tech elite gather to complain about wokeness and celebrate Donald Trump’s plutocrat-friendly policies.

My Nation colleague Chris Lehmann wrote about these group chats in a recent column. He joins the podcast to explain exactly why these wealthy leaders are becoming open supporters of autocracy.

The Nation Podcasts
The Nation Podcasts

Here's where to find podcasts from The Nation. Political talk without the boring parts, featuring the writers, activists and artists who shape the news, from a progressive perspective.

What Jeffrey Epstein Taught Peter Thiel and Steve Bannon w/ Branko Marcetic | The Time of Monsters with Jeet Heer
byThe Nation Magazine

The late Jeffrey Epstein was friends with all sorts of elite figures in the US and many other countries. This extensive network is now sometimes described as “the Epstein class.” The question is, was this class held together merely by the opportunistic trading of favors or did it have a coherent worldview and agenda?

Branko Marcetic has written a series of articles in Jacobin that clarify this issue by looking at relationships Epstein had with the billionaire Peter Thiel and the political operative Steve Bannon.

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Subscribe to The Nation to Support all of our podcasts

Your support makes stories like this possible

From illegal war on Iran to an inhumane fuel blockade of Cuba, from AI weapons to crypto corruption, this is a time of staggering chaos, cruelty, and violence. 

Unlike other publications that parrot the views of authoritarians, billionaires, and corporations, The Nation publishes stories that hold the powerful to account and center the communities too often denied a voice in the national media—stories like the one you’ve just read.

Each day, our journalism cuts through lies and distortions, contextualizes the developments reshaping politics around the globe, and advances progressive ideas that oxygenate our movements and instigate change in the halls of power. 

This independent journalism is only possible with the support of our readers. If you want to see more urgent coverage like this, please donate to The Nation today.

Jeet Heer

Jeet Heer is a national affairs correspondent for The Nation and host of the weekly Nation podcast, The Time of Monsters. He also pens the monthly column “Morbid Symptoms.” The author of In Love with Art: Francoise Mouly’s Adventures in Comics with Art Spiegelman (2013) and Sweet Lechery: Reviews, Essays and Profiles (2014), Heer has written for numerous publications, including The New Yorker, The Paris Review, Virginia Quarterly Review, The American Prospect, The GuardianThe New Republic, and The Boston Globe.

More from The Nation

x