Lionizing Bandits

Responding to: The Democratic Socialists of America Hate Billionaires — Except Fidel Castro — John Fund · 2026-08-23

What the Piece Argues

John Fund’s National Review column argues that the Democratic Socialists of America have a selective definition of “billionaire.” While publicly attacking productive wealth — quoting Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s claim that billionaires “shouldn’t exist” and Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s assertion that “you can’t earn a billion dollars” — the DSA celebrated Fidel Castro on what would have been his 100th birthday as “an organizer, a fighter, and stalwart symbol of anti-imperialist struggle and self-determination.” Fund notes that DSA national co-chairs Ashik Siddique and Megan Romer refused to call Cuba, Venezuela, or Nicaragua dictatorships when pressed by Jorge Ramos, with Romer claiming Cubans “have access to their democracy in a way that we do not.” The piece documents that Castro himself accumulated a fortune estimated at $900 million in 2006 per Forbes research, with 29 luxury homes, four yachts, and a private island — while his extended family now holds $18 billion in cash reserves. Fund concludes by flagging a DSA delegation to China that attended a parade featuring Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong-un, suggesting the organization’s pro-Beijing wing is “laundering an authoritarian state’s preferred narratives in exchange for VIP treatment.”

Receipts

The DSA’s anti-billionaire stance is a costume, not a conviction — worn against productive wealth and removed the moment a dictator with a private island walks by.

• The Castro exception. On what would have been Castro’s 100th birthday, the DSA praised him as “an organizer, a fighter, and stalwart symbol of anti-imperialist struggle and self-determination,” while denouncing Secretary of State Marco Rubio for supposedly “committing genocide against the Cuban people.”
• The dictatorship dodge. When Jorge Ramos pressed DSA national co-chairs Ashik Siddique and Megan Romer on whether Cuba, Venezuela, or Nicaragua are dictatorships, neither would say so. Romer claimed “Cubans have access to their democracy in a way that we do not” — i.e., Cuba is more democratic than the United States. Siddique invoked the U.S. embargo as the cause of Cuba’s problems rather than Castro’s Marxism, and added: “It’s hard for us to judge other countries being dictatorships when we have Donald Trump as president.”
• The wealth they refuse to count. Forbes research listed Castro’s personal wealth at $900 million and growing in 2006, per former Forbes wealth reporter Monica Showalter; his extended family now sits on $18 billion in cash reserves, much of it parked in Europe and the U.S. His defected bodyguard Juan Reinaldo Sánchez documented in The Double Life of Fidel Castro (2016) the regime’s 29 luxury homes, four yachts, and a private island — Cayo Piedra — with a dolphinarium, a floating restaurant, and a helipad.
• The productive-billionaire target. AOC: “You can get market power, you can break rules, you can abuse labor laws, you can pay people less than what they’re worth, but you can’t earn that.” Showalter’s read: the DSA views Elon Musk as “the bad guy,” while Castro, “who stole and hid his wealth, is the hero.”
• The foreign-policy laundering. Five high-ranking DSA activists visited China last year on a trip organized by Chinese officials, with stops including a parade attended by Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong-un. DSA China working group member Dee Knight reported Beijing “buzzed with excitement” and has defended China against accusations of Uyghur slave labor. Portland State professor Alexander Reid Ross: “It looks like what they’re doing is laundering an authoritarian state’s preferred narratives in exchange for VIP treatment.”
• The mechanism. The DSA does not oppose wealth. It opposes earning. Wealth stolen from a population and hidden on a private island with a helipad is celebrated; wealth produced by serving customers is reviled. The class line is real but inverted.

The Response Ladder

Polite Reframe

When to use: When you’re in a meeting, a family dinner, or a workplace chat and need to defuse the “the DSA just hates inequality” talking point without turning it into a brawl.

The DSA’s anti-billionaire posturing has a glaring exception, and the exception is Fidel Castro. AOC has said you cannot earn a billion dollars — that you can only get it through market power, broken rules, and labor abuse. Castro, by her own definition, fits the bill: $900 million in personal wealth per Forbes in 2006, $18 billion in family cash reserves, 29 luxury homes, four yachts, and a private island with a dolphinarium. None of it earned. All of it seized. And on what would have been Castro’s 100th birthday, the DSA praised him as “a stalwart symbol of anti-imperialist struggle and self-determination.” When Jorge Ramos asked DSA national co-chairs whether Cuba is a dictatorship, they wouldn’t say so. One co-chair claimed that Cubans “have access to their democracy in a way that we do not.” The DSA doesn’t oppose billionaires. It opposes billionaires who earn their money. Wealth stolen from a population and hidden offshore? That’s their kind of billionaire.

Mockery and Ridicule

When to use: When you want the reader to laugh at how transparently the DSA’s moral framework collapses the moment a red flag with a beard appears in it.

The Democratic Socialists of America would like you to know that billionaires are an existential threat to the republic — the fruit of stolen labor, broken laws, and abused workers — unless the billionaire in question is Fidel Castro, in which case he is a “stalwart symbol of anti-imperialist struggle and self-determination.” Sure. The man with 29 luxury homes, four yachts, and a private island featuring a dolphinarium. The man whose family now sits on $18 billion in cash reserves, much of it conveniently parked in Europe and the United States. The man whose defected bodyguard wrote an entire book about his offshore playground. The man whose DSA co-chair Megan Romer assures us has “access to democracy in a way that we do not” — i.e., Castro’s Cuba is more democratic than America. You can almost hear the choirs in Havana warming up. The DSA’s billionaire rule, as Monica Showalter of Forbes puts it, is breathtakingly simple: thieves are heroes, producers are villains. Castro stole and hid his wealth — heroic. Elon Musk built reusable rockets and made landing them boring — public enemy number one. The moral architecture of this movement is a funhouse mirror in a clown car.

Nuclear Satire

When to use: When mockery alone is not enough and you want to drive the hypocrisy home with the full force of an op-ed column that knows exactly what it is doing.

By the DSA’s own moral theology, Fidel Castro is the apotheosis of the billionaire class. He ran a one-party state for half a century while 90 percent of his population lived in extreme poverty. He accumulated, by Forbes’s own research in 2006, a personal fortune of $900 million and growing — while his extended family now sits on $18 billion in cash reserves — money that, by AOC’s own logic, could not possibly have been “earned” but was rather seized through “market power,” “broken rules,” “abused labor laws,” and people “paid less than what they’re worth.” Exactly. So why is he a “stalwart symbol of anti-imperialist struggle” while Elon Musk is a supervillain? Because the DSA’s anti-billionarianism is not about money. It is about who is allowed to keep it. If you stole it from workers and hid it on a private island with a helipad and a floating restaurant, congratulations — you are a revolutionary. If you built it by selling things people wanted to buy, you are a class enemy. Castro exploited a country for fifty years and the DSA calls him a fighter. Musk built rockets and they call him a war criminal. The math is not complicated. The morals are not even pretending to be.

Profane Scorched-Earth

When to use: When the hypocrisy is so staggering that niceties are a disservice to the truth and the catharsis is the whole point.

These fucking people. The Democratic Socialists of America — the same DSA whose rising star Zohran Mamdani says billionaires “shouldn’t exist,” whose diva Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez lectures us that “you can’t earn a billion dollars … you can get market power, you can break rules, you can abuse labor laws” — wrote a fucking tribute to Fidel Castro on his 100th birthday. They called him a “stalwart symbol of anti-imperialist struggle and self-determination” while denouncing Marco Rubio for “genocide against the Cuban people.” Genocide! Castro, who held Cuba in an iron grip for over half a century while 90 percent of his own people lived in fucking poverty! Castro, whose defected bodyguard Juan Reinaldo Sánchez wrote a whole goddamn book — The Double Life of Fidel Castro: My 17 Years as Personal Bodyguard to El Líder Máximo — detailing 29 luxury homes, four yachts, a private island with a dolphinarium and a helipad! Castro, whose personal wealth Forbes pegged at $900 million in 2006, whose extended family now sits on $18 billion in cash reserves! Castro, who was, by AOC’s own fucking definition of a billionaire, the worst kind — the kind who got his money through “market power” and “broken rules” and “abusing labor laws”! And the DSA’s co-chairs won’t even call his regime a dictatorship! Megan Romer stood there on Univision and said Cubans “have access to their democracy in a way that we do not” — i.e., Castro’s Cuba is more democratic than fucking America! And then five high-ranking DSA activists flew to Beijing on a trip organized by Chinese officials and stood in a parade watching Putin and Kim Jong-un goose-step by, and their man Dee Knight said Beijing “buzzed with excitement” and defended the Uyghur camps! This is the fucking movement that wants to run your country. They hate billionaires — except the ones who steal their billions at gunpoint. They hate wealth — except the wealth hidden on private islands. They hate power — except the power of a man who held 11 million people hostage for fifty years and called it self-determination. The DSA isn’t against billionaires. The DSA is against earning. Every fucking dollar that wasn’t stolen from workers is suspect to them; every dictator with a Swiss account is a hero. They are not leftists. They are fucking cultists for authoritarian thievery dressed up in a moral vocabulary they use to beat the rest of us over the head. Burn the whole rotten fucking thing down.