What smart people are saying about Trump Media charging for early access to the president's Truth Social posts

• Trump Media launched Truth API on Saturday.
• Truth API sells early access to posts from prominent Truth Social users like President Donald Trump.
• Reuters reported that Trump Media considered selling that access for $100,000 a month.

“Moves like this cheapen Trump’s policy wins (of which there have been many),” Maguire said.

Dean Baker

Dean Baker, cofounder of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, said the service may work at the expense of everyday Americans.

“And, since reporters are too lazy to tell people, the money that insider traders pocket is money taken from the 401(k)s and IRAs of normal people who work for a living,” Baker said in an X post on Saturday.

James Surowiecki

On Sunday, finance journalist and author James Surowiecki said he believes Truth API violates insider trading laws.

“Trump is disclosing information (in this case, information about some of his future public statements as president, including statements about policy) that belongs to the US government in exchange for money. That violates his duty of trust and confidence to his employer (the govt), and is illegal,” Surowiecki said on X. “And anyone who pays for the feed is knowingly paying for misappropriated information, which is illegal as well.”

Jason Calacanis

“All-In” podcast cohost Jason Calacanis said the Truth API was evidence that those close to Trump aren’t giving him “good feedback.”

“They’re simply too scared to lose their position close to the Oval to just say ‘this is a very dumb idea.’ Everyone needs someone who says ‘that’s a dumb idea’ around them — especially successful people,” Calacanis said on Sunday. “The country is going to have endless, justified investigations into these ‘projects.'”

In a separate post, Calacanis said: “Imagine you’re running the SEC and the administration says for $1.2m a year he will let you front run the market!”

Joe Saluzzi

Joe Saluzzi, cofounder of Themis Trading, a brokerage for institutional investors, said in an interview with the Associated Press that Truth API will enable its customers to bypass other traders.

“Somebody who buys the info and has a system built to process it will be able to act quicker than you and me,” Saluzzi said. “The loser is always the retail investor.”

Zach Everson

On Bluesky, Zach Everson, the director of Public Citizen’s Trump Accountability Project, called the notion that Trump wouldn’t profit during a presidency a “farce.”

“But you’re telling me Trump Media decided to sell Wall Street the fastest access to Trump’s posts without running it by him first?” Everson said after the service was first announced. The president is owns a majority stake in Trump Media.

Vuk Vukovic