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President Donald Trump has made the U.S. government Intel’s largest shareholder, authorizing the purchase of a 10% stake in the beleaguered American chipmaker. The move breaks with the GOP’s free-market economic ideology and has drawn criticism from conservatives who are usually supportive of Trump.

But Trump said the deal was a “wonderful investment” that will make the United States “richer and richer,” and promised to do more of the same in the future. “I hope I’m going to have many more cases like it,” Trump said, advocating an industrial policy by another name.

The question now is whether the move goes so far as to be socialistic. For generations, a key tenet of socialism has been government ownership of the means of production in the name of a larger social good. If that is the test, Trump’s move may be indistinguishable from similar efforts in countries such as China or Russia.

Indeed, the decision by the presumptive GOP nominee has drawn comparisons from all sides to many of the policies favored by the American left.

“When Barack Obama tried to nationalize General Motors and Chrysler, the New York Times thought that was the end of America. But when Donald Trump does the same thing, it’s fine. Huh?” former White House aide Omarosa Manigault Newman wrote on Twitter.

Conservatives remain skeptical. Larry Kudlow, who was Trump’s top economic adviser, called the idea of a government taking a 10% stake in Intel “off the table” when he was in the White House, and on Fox Business, said he was “very, very uncomfortable with that idea.”

Steve Moore, another Trump informal adviser, was blunter. “I hate corporate welfare. That’s privatization in reverse. We want the government to divest of assets, not buy assets. So terrible, one of the bad ideas that’s come out of this White House,” Moore said.

An editorial in National Review said the move “should set off alarm bells: government shouldn’t get into the chip business.” Senator Thom Tillis called it “extremely concerning” and warned the deal could lead to a “semi-state-owned enterprise a la CCCP” — a reference to the former Soviet Union. “Exactly what good does that do?” he added.

Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) made the same point on Twitter: “Wouldn’t the government owning part of Intel be a step toward socialism? Terrible idea.”

Few conservatives support the move, but some on the left are applauding it. Progressive Senator Bernie Sanders cheered the decision, writing, “President Trump just took a big step in the right direction!”

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick rushed to Trump’s defense, telling Laura Ingraham, “That is not socialism. That’s the best businessman in the United States of America in the Oval Office doing fair things for us.”

Intel, for its part, is sounding a few alarms of its own. The chipmaker said in an SEC filing required by the government’s investment that the deal could make it more difficult to secure future grants from the federal government, could hurt its sales in global markets, and “may result in more regulation of our business.”

Intel is not having the best of times. The company had already announced plans to cut 15% of its workforce earlier this year and laid out its plan to reverse years of losses and customer snubs in the lucrative data center market at a big analyst day meeting last month.

The company’s shares trade at a market cap of around $110 billion, down 50% since the start of 2024, though the stock jumped 4% following Trump’s announcement.

The Wall Street Journal reported that Trump wanted Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan to resign due to his previous ties to China, and initially insisted that the company’s 10% investment would not happen if Tan did not step down. But after a meeting at the White House, Trump was won over. “I liked him a lot, I thought he was very good,” he said.

Trump has promised that the U.S. government, as Intel’s largest shareholder, will not have a say in Intel’s business and will not be involved in any voting. Critics note that the president of the United States, regardless of assurances, is almost by definition the most powerful player in a company when that president becomes its largest shareholder.

Intel has one incentive to do what Trump wants: The federal government has the option to increase its stake to 20% over the next three years and has made clear that more public money could be at stake.

Trump’s willingness to go beyond the standard policy prescriptions for the American right to gain a public victory, at taxpayer expense, is risky politics. If Intel turns around, Trump will take credit for helping shore up an American tech icon. If it doesn’t, it will be the taxpayers on the hook.

The White House may think it has sidestepped the politics of this decision by promising not to meddle in Intel’s business. But Trump has also promised to do similar deals with other companies. The question of whether this move is socialistic, capitalistic, or just Trumpism will get a lot louder if it happens again.

The Intel deal, even with its flaws, marks a paradigm shift in the relationship between the federal government and the private sector. It also reveals just how far Trump has moved the GOP’s economic policy beyond free-market orthodoxy.