No Fortune 100 CEOs – a gaggle that has traditionally leaned Republican – have donated to Former President Donald Trump’s 2024 marketing campaign, Yale Faculty of Administration Professor Jeffrey Sonnefeld advised Fortune.
Solely two donated to Trump in 2020, and 0 once more in 2016, in response to new information from Yale’s Chief Govt Management Institute, which Sonnefeld heads. Against this, 28 Fortune 100 CEOs donated to Utah Senator Mitt Romney’s 2012 marketing campaign, and 29 donated to John McCain in 2018.
The determine is only one indication that Trump has the “lowest stage of company assist” within the Republican Occasion’s historical past, Sonnefeld mentioned. Knowledgeable by his shut expertise working with high CEOs – he has led discussions with the heads of PepsiCo, Ford, UPS, Verizon, and IBM, to call a number of – Sonnefeld famous that lots of them “despise” Trump’s social and financial insurance policies.
These CEOs, a gaggle that’s often 65-70% Republican, are “both enthusiastically or reluctantly” going to vote for Biden as an alternative, Sonnefeld added. He listed off about 30 high CEOs, together with Melinda French Gates, David Ellison (son of Larry Ellison, the founding father of Oracle), and Reed Hastings, as Biden supporters.
The concept runs opposite to a number of current articles in main media shops suggesting that enterprise leaders are flocking again to Trump after rejecting him in 2020. Final week, Trump met with dozens of high executives and promised additional company tax cuts. Stephen Moore, one among Trump’s closest financial advisors and (briefly) his nominee to go the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, advised Fortune that he attended the assembly and the CEOs have been “enthralled” by Trump.
Financial insurance policies
Nonetheless, Sonnefeld mentioned that high CEOs imagine that the proposed tax cuts are inflationary with out reductions in authorities spending, an concept that Moore rejected as “utterly silly.” Moore claimed that company tax cuts create extra demand for {dollars} by rising the worth of overseas funding.
“Whenever you create extra demand for {dollars}, meaning the worth of the greenback will increase and costs fall relative to the greenback,” Moore mentioned. “That’s what occurred after the Trump tax lower.”
Current financial analysis signifies that Trump’s company tax cuts did enhance enterprise funding, however not practically sufficient for the extra progress to “pay for” these cuts, as Trump’s staff has lengthy claimed it might. The Congressional Finances Workplace estimates {that a} full extension of the cuts, which is able to start expiring in 2026, would value $4.9 trillion over 10 years, together with further curiosity on the debt. The federal authorities’s publicly held debt stands at practically $27.6 trillion, or roughly 108% of the GDP.
Regardless, Sonnefeld mentioned that company tax cuts are extra of a priority for the ultra-wealthy, naming enterprise capitalist David Sacks and Timothy Mellon, the inheritor to the Mellon banking fortune, as constituents with curiosity in such cuts. Each males have supported Trump.
If something, Biden’s antitrust insurance policies and assist for stronger capital beneficial properties taxes, which Sonnefeld opposes, are extra of a priority for the CEOs, he mentioned.
“No person’s saying that the Biden insurance policies are excellent, and there are some issues,” Sonnenfeld mentioned. “However they’re dwarfed by the pernicious risk to inflation, financial stability, and, most significantly, democracy introduced by the potential Trump presidency.”
The CEO riseup of 2020
Many high CEOs have been extremely disturbed by Trump’s rejection of the election outcomes, Sonnefeld mentioned.
On the night time of November 6, 2020, when Trump declared himself the winner, Sonnefeld says he obtained a manifold of texts and calls from anxious CEOs. They wished him to tug collectively a gaggle of enterprise leaders to put in writing an announcement affirming that Biden was the election’s true winner.
“I figured everyone else on the market has cash, sources, and repute on the road, they usually should determine I’ve nothing to lose if it doesn’t work,” Sonnefeld mentioned.
He referred to as 100 CEOs – the subsequent morning, 94 of them confirmed as much as a 7:00 a.m. Zoom name to draft their factors. The chief executives from Goldman Sachs, Johnson & Johnson, and Walmart have been there, to call a number of, the Monetary Instances reported on the time.
Sonnefeld declined to call any attendees, however he famous that almost all have been Republican-leaning. Nonetheless, the CEOs, with out their employees or press individuals surrounding them, overtly condemned what occurred the night time earlier than.
“It was a really highly effective, open dialogue,” Sonnefeld mentioned. Performing because the scribe, he wrote down a number of factors from the group, first congratulating Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, then noting that if somebody challenges the election outcomes, they need to be sued.
The Enterprise Roundtable, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the Nationwide Affiliation of Producers, and others printed that assertion.
After the January 6 riots, the group met once more and unanimously referred to as for Trump’s impeachment, Sonnefeld mentioned.
Moore declined to touch upon the group or its actions, saying he wasn’t acquainted with it. Nonetheless, he referred to as Trump the candidate for small companies, including that Biden is the candidate for giant enterprise and Wall Road pursuits.
“There’s little question about that,” Moore mentioned. He added that, given how superior he believed Trump’s financial insurance policies to be in comparison with Biden’s, every kind of companies now ought to view Trump “rather more favorably” on this election.
“It’s a special ball recreation now,” he mentioned.