Bernie Sanders Highlights How Handful Of Billionaires Like Mark Zuckerberg, Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos Are Controlling What Americans See

On Tuesday, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) sounded the alarm over the concentration of media power in the hands of a few ultra-wealthy individuals.

Sanders Warns Of Media Oligarchy In U.S.

Sanders took to X to outline his concerns, noting that in authoritarian societies, the media is often controlled by a small group.

He then drew parallels to the U.S., pointing out that Tesla Inc. (NASDAQ:TSLA) and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk owns X, Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META) CEO Mark Zuckerberg controls Facebook and Instagram, "The Ellisons," own stakes in CBS and are eyeing CNN and TikTok's U.S. operations and Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) founder Jeff Bezos owns Twitch and The Washington Post.

When Sanders referred to "the Ellisons," he was pointing to Paramount Skydance Corp. (NASDAQ:PSKY) CEO David Ellison and his father, Larry Ellison, the co-founder and CTO of Oracle Corp. (NYSE:ORCL).

"We must combat oligarchy," Sanders wrote.

Musk Tops $442 Billion As Tech Leaders Control Highest Net Worth Rankings

According to Bloomberg's Billionaires Index, the tech sector continues to dominate the ranks of the world's wealthiest.

Musk leads the list with an estimated net worth of $442 billion. Oracle's Ellison ranks fourth at $254 billion, while Bezos sits close behind at $251 billion.

Zuckerberg ranks sixth on the Index with a net worth of $225 billion.

Social Media Landscape Shows Concentration

Data from Statcounter GlobalStats highlights the dominance of these platforms in the U.S.: Facebook accounts for nearly 59% of social media usage, Pinterest (NYSE:PINS) 16%, X 14%, Instagram 6% with YouTube, a subsidiary of Alphabet Inc.'s (NASDAQ:GOOG) (NASDAQ:GOOGL) Google and Reddit Inc. (NYSE:RDDT) under 3% each.

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