Peter Thiel has raised concerns about Donald Trump’s second administration. The PayPal and Palantir co-founder, who backed Trump early in his 2016 campaign, said the administration’s staffing, saying it consists of “not very smart, but very loyal people.”
Peter Thiel criticizes the president’s reliance on loyalty tests in his second term
Thiel made the remarks during a September 24 podcast interview with German journalist Mathias Döpfner on MD Meets. Döpfner asked Thiel to reflect on Trump’s record, saying, “Ten years later, how would you analyze his achievements? How would you analyze his failures? Where do you stand today with regard to the last two years and the first term of the president?”
The 58-year-old said the question would be better answered in another 10 years. However, he added that he wished the president had chosen “more competent people” for his administration. He said, “I think the two administrations kind of made opposite mistakes. You know, the first administration brought in all these people who couldn’t agree, and it was just all this internal fighting.”
“The second administration, I think, had all these — they overcorrected for the mistake of the first term with all these loyalty tests. You got sort of an administration staffed by not very smart, but very loyal people. And so there are all sorts of ways it can be criticised,” he added.
Thiel said, The Republican Party is always a little bit the anti-establishment one. So, if the Democratic Socialists take over the Democratic Party, that’s a much bigger deal. And that is like — I don’t know — the end of America.” Stating further, he expressed that he supported the political disruption Trump represented in 2016, but “I don’t want disruption of the Democratic Socialist variety. That seems catastrophic.”
The remarks come ahead of the November 2026 midterm elections. According to The New York Times, in 2016, Thiel emerged as one of Trump’s earliest Silicon Valley backers, donating a total of $1.25 million through super PACs and direct donations to the campaign.
