Trump Picks Vulture Capitalist Carl Icahn as Special Adviser on Overhauling Federal Regulations

Infamous Corporate Raider Has Reputation of Gutting Companies, Putting Many Out of Work

Donald Trump has chosen vulture capitalist Carl Icahn to become special adviser to the president on overhauling federal regulations. The man whose actions, especially in the 1980’s, gave rise to the term corporate raider, supposedly like Trump, is a billionaire many time over.

“Carl was with me from the beginning and with his being one of the world’s great businessmen, that was something I truly appreciated,” President-elect Trump said in a statement. “He is not only a brilliant negotiator, but also someone who is innately able to predict the future especially having to do with finances and economies. His help on the strangling regulations that our country is faced with will be invaluable.”

It’s unclear what Icahn would be responsible for but clearly eliminating regulations that protect consumers and investors would likely be his primary targets.

“Carl Icahn will be advising the President in his individual capacity and will not be serving as a federal employee or a Special Government Employee and will not have any specific duties,” the statement concludes.

“Icahn is what everyone hates about the American economy who’s not a billionaire,” labor activist Michael Kink said in a FORTUNE article earlier this year. “Kink calls Icahn the ‘OG corporate raider,'” a reference to the hip-hop term for original gangster,” Forbes wrote.

In “The 10 worst people on Forbes’ 2013 billionaire list,” Salon put Icahn at number 7, writing:

“Icahn’s face should be placed beside the term ‘corporate raider’ in any dictionary of financial chicanery. C.E. Meyer, the chairman of Trans World Airlines, which was taken over by Icahn, famously called him ‘one of the greediest men on earth.’ Also referred to as ‘Icahn the Barbarian,’ his specialty has been taking over a company, selling its assets to pay the debt used for the purchase, and sending jobs down the toilet while enriching himself. The elderly vulture capitalist has lately been thinking about his legacy and is attempting to rebrand himself as a ‘shareholder activist.’ That’s rather a tall order for the man who, along with Ivan Boesky, served as the inspiration for Gordon Gekko in the film Wall Street.”

 

Image by Gage Skidmore via Flickr and a CC license

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