/ world today news/ Big business is preparing for the return of former President Trump, as the Republicans seem certain to give him a third chance at the White House.
After Trump scored key victories in Iowa and New Hampshire against former UN ambassador Nikki Haley – the preferred choice of some big business figures – corporate leaders appear to be looking to get out of the former president’s crosshairs.
“Most senior business people I talk to can’t stand it. They just recognize that he’s very dangerous to the country,” said Larry Harris, a finance professor at the University of Southern California and former chief economist at the Securities and Exchange Commission.
“But no one wants to open their mouths. Because unless they all act at the same time, anyone who appears is destroyed instantly.
JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon, who urged fellow business leaders to back Haley just two months ago, praised Trump’s first-term policies while at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, earlier this month.
“Just take a step back and be honest,” Dimon said.
“He was somewhat right about NATO. He was kind of right about immigration. He developed the economy quite well. Trade, tax reform worked. He was right about part of China.
“I don’t like how he said things about Mexico, but he’s not wrong on some of these critical issues,” he added.
Dimon also spoke out in defense of Trump supporters, calling on President Biden and Democrats to “grow up.”
“I mean, really, can we just stop this stuff and actually grow up and treat other people with respect and listen to them a little bit?”
Stephen Schwartzman, chairman and CEO of investment firm Blackstone, also changed his stance on the former president.
The GOP mega-donor came out against Trump in November, saying it was “time for the GOP to turn to a new generation of leaders.”
In Davos, however, Schwartzman did not rule out supporting the former president again.
“I’m in ‘Let’s wait and see how this works,'” he said when asked if he would support Trump in the election.
“I’m not in the hypothetical world yet, as much as you wish I were. And we’ll see what happens. There are always surprises in this election.”
Anthony Scaramucci, who briefly served as Trump’s White House communications director and has since become a frequent critic of the former president, accused Wall Street of being “basically unconcerned” about the 2024 election.
“I think they view Donald Trump as generally benign to somewhat beneficial to the economy and business,” he said in an interview with The Hill earlier this month.
Harris suggested that most business leaders don’t want to suffer the consequences of taking on Trump alone.
“I mean, look what happened to Disney from [бивш кандидат-президент на републиканците и губернатор Рон] DeSantis in Florida, and DeSantis didn’t have any of the power that Trump has,” he added.
After defeating Haley in New Hampshire by a narrower-than-expected margin, Trump took to Truth Social to warn that any donors supporting the former UN ambassador would be “permanently banned from the MAGA camp.”
“When I ran for office and won, I noticed that the losing candidate’s ‘donors’ would immediately come to me and want to ‘help.’ It is a standard in politics, but it is no longer with me,” he said.
“We don’t want them and we won’t accept them because we put America first and ALWAYS WILL!” Trump added.
The former president also has a history of publicly attacking business leaders, particularly on social media.
Shortly after being elected president in 2016, he called on the federal government to cancel its order with Boeing for a revamped Air Force One, criticizing the cost of the project as “out of control” in a post on Twitter.
In late 2018 and early 2019, Trump repeatedly called out General Motors CEO Mary Barra and at one point threatened to cut subsidies for the automaker’s electric vehicles after he announced plans to cut 15,000 jobs locations and closing five plants.
He also called for a boycott of Goodyear in 2020 after the company banned its employees from wearing “MAGA brands.”
While some companies may benefit from potential tax reforms or deregulation efforts under the former president, business experts suggest another Trump term would pose a risk to big business.
The Trump era “has turned out to be a little less stable,” said Daniel Alpert, managing partner at investment firm Westwood Capital.
“You always have to remember that business interests are really motivated by stability, and that’s any form of stability — price stability, political stability, consumer demand, any kind of stability — because that allows them to plan and make profits,” Alpert said.
Andrew Lockay, senior research analyst at Beacon Policy Advisors, also noted that the business community will have to adjust to a return to Trump’s protectionist approach to trade in a second term.
“In a second term, I expect Trump to take his America First policy to the next level,” Lokai told The Hill.
“He called for a universal 10 percent tariff on imports from all countries, a move that would significantly pull the United States out of the global economy.”
However, some companies, such as domestic manufacturers, have previously welcomed Trump’s tariff policies and are “quite keen on the idea of more protectionism,” Alpert said.
He added that heavily regulated industries would also likely support the more “les-fere” approach to regulation that would be favored by another Trump administration.
Lockay also noted that the business community as a whole would welcome the potential for unified Republican control of government under a second Trump administration, given that provisions in the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act expire in 2025 and GOP control would increase the likelihood of further individual and corporate tax relief.
“I don’t believe there’s a consensus on what’s ultimately going to happen here, and the reason is that there are so many potential entry and exit ramps that could affect the outcome between now and the general election,” Alpert said .
Translation: SM
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