“Every Door You Open Ultimately Leads To Blackstone”

Here at The Lever, we’ve made it our mission to expose the people and corporations manipulating the levers of power. It’s why we’re excited to unveil David Sirota’s work in The Ruling Class, a new docuseries by Academy Award-winning documentary filmmaker Alex Gibney that profiles members of the social and business elite who use their outsized influence to manipulate the world around them.

David joins the series for its episode “American Buyout,” which explains the rise of Stephen Schwarzman, CEO of Blackstone, the world’s largest private equity firm.

We’ve been detailing Schwarzman and Blackstone’s dirty dealings for years — from their role in the student housing crisis, skyrocketing evictions, child labor exploitation, and the destruction of the planet, to how the firm bankrolled insurrectionists, fascists, and wannabe fascists. This episode connects the dots to illustrate how Schwarzman has become one of the most powerful and diabolical forces in the country.

As Sirota notes in the program:

“Private equity lurks one or two layers in the background from the things that we interface with in our daily lives. So Steve Schwarzman is fairly low profile compared to how powerful he is. It’s like the Wizard of Oz. Every door you open ultimately leads to Blackstone running larger and larger parts of the economy. He really is the man behind the curtain.”

You can watch “American Buyout” and other The Ruling Class episodes on power brokers like Elon Musk and Betsy DeVos on the MGM+ streaming service. Click here to see if you already have an MGM+ subscription through your TV or digital provider, or to sign up for a seven-day free trial. (If you continue after that, the service costs $5.99 a month.)