Trump, whose populist themes have alarmed some Republicans, has told business executives and big donors that he is the only bulwark against Democrats’ tax-hike plans. He has even told wealthy supporters that he needs their help countering the financial clout of unions that he is trying to lobby against. The convention also offered a friendly platform for the nation’s business elite.
The two opposing views on the future of the Republican Party make it unclear how the former president would try to balance factions within his party if he wins the presidential election in November, perhaps rekindling tensions over economic policy that defined his first term.
“We may be in the midst of a political realignment, where Wall Street and the Chamber of Commerce may be all Democrats and the unions all Republicans by 2028, but I wouldn’t bet on it,” said Michael Strain, director of economic and policy studies at the conservative American Enterprise Institute.
A speech by National Labor President Sean O’Brien on Monday was the most concrete sign yet of Trump’s attempt to cast the party in a new light on economic issues.
“At what point did you think we’d see something like that at the Republican National Convention?” Trump campaign senior adviser Chris LaCivita asked reporters in Milwaukee on Tuesday, referring to O’Brien’s speech.
Trump had been courting the Teamsters even before the convention. “The Teamsters really like me,” he told a crowd of billionaires and real estate executives at a fundraiser this year at New York’s Pierre Hotel. “I’ve used the Teamsters my whole life for concrete. Every concrete contractor here is a Teamster.”
“I’m going to get their vote anyway,” Trump told his guests. “The working people are going to vote for me. They’re not going to vote for that guy.”
But most labor unions are backing President Biden for reelection this fall. Biden is also pushing populist economic policies while raising huge amounts of money from billionaire donors and other financial elites, but his policy agenda is more aligned with that of the labor union movement.
O’Brien did not endorse Trump on Monday. The Teamsters have not yet endorsed a candidate. A prominent Republican strategist close to some of the party’s major donors, speaking on the condition of anonymity to provide a candid assessment, said there was a lot of dissatisfaction with O’Brien’s convention speech. But people were reluctant to say it publicly because they knew Trump was trying to court labor unions and win their support, the strategist said.
But Trump’s rhetoric among the business elite has not been as worker-friendly.
At a business roundtable event in June, Trump told CEOs he would cut corporate taxes again, delighting attendees, donors said, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss private remarks. At several fundraisers this year, Trump urged the wealthiest CEOs to write big checks to Democrats, citing unions’ generous contributions to the Democratic Party. At another fundraiser in Texas, he urged the wealthiest donors to give because “the Democrats get millions of dollars from the unions.”
He made it very clear that they should support him because he would lower corporate taxes.
Some mainstream party officials said they were pleased with the way the race was shaping up this week. Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin, a former private-equity executive, is deeply rooted in the Republican Party’s pro-business tradition. But in an interview with The Washington Post in Milwaukee, he praised the choice of Sen. J.D. Vance of Ohio as his running mate, pointing to the senator’s military service and track record as a self-made man. Vance is seen as closer to the party’s populist wing.
Youngkin said he doesn’t see Vance’s selection as a sign of the Republican Party shifting toward more populist economic policies, mainly because the president sets the policy, which Youngkin expects to be an extension of the first Trump administration, featuring further tax cuts and fewer regulations.
“President Trump is going to set the course for the country and build a vibrant economy,” Youngkin said. “He’s done it before and he’s going to do it again.”
A quick look around the venue showed the convention also had plenty of room for business executives — Gary Cohn, the former Goldman Sachs executive who served as Trump’s top economic adviser in the White House, was milling around the venue — and big companies hosted parties every night.
In an interview with Bloomberg published Tuesday, Trump also called for lowering the corporate tax rate from 21% to 15%, something some advisers have said he won’t do, but he also suggested he might choose billionaire JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon for Treasury secretary.
Many business interest groups, including the Chamber of Commerce and the Business Roundtable, have long been wary of some of the Trump administration’s cornerstone economic policies, such as its tougher trade policies and crackdown on illegal immigration during its first term. On these points, Trump and Vance already aligned before Vance joined the Republican ticket.
And some pro-business Republicans worry they will be less able to block Trump’s most destructive policies. That could mean less effort from Trump to push through policies that were a priority for previous generations of Republican policymakers, like repealing Obamacare or cutting food stamps. Meanwhile, a second Trump administration would probably also take steps that are anathema to Wall Street-friendly Republicans, like escalating a global trade war or carrying out mass deportations.
Trump included language in the Republican platform saying Republicans currently support tariffs, according to a person familiar with the drafting of the bill.
“He’s a big government, big government, beyond Reaganism, that kind of thinking,” one Trump adviser, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to speak candidly, said of Vance, “and now he’s the candidate to succeed him.”
Trump’s first term was marked by frequent disputes over economic policy between two factions of his administration: pro-business Republicans such as Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and Trump’s chief economic adviser Larry Kudlow, and economic populists such as strategist Stephen K. Bannon, trade adviser Peter Navarro, and Bob Lighthizer, who advocated greater confrontation with China.
Mr. Trump enjoys pitting the two camps against each other and has taken populist steps such as raising tariffs on U.S. trading partners. But aside from tariffs, his policies have fully reflected the priorities of Mr. Mnuchin and Mr. Kudlow, from cutting corporate taxes to appointing Wall Street-friendly regulators to trying to cut government spending on social programs.
Since Trump left office, the two camps have been vying for influence, vying for key positions in a second administration, but Vance’s elevation may be the clearest signal yet that economic populists are more likely to have a voice in a second term than they did in the first.
Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Missouri) told The Washington Post that Vance “is a vocal advocate for what I call economic nationalism, economic populism, and its essence is rebuilding American industry and protecting American jobs.”
Hawley said he was optimistic that if Trump is re-elected, he would pursue this policy agenda, which includes significantly expanding tariffs and embracing labor legislation that Republicans have traditionally opposed.
“We’ve never had that in my lifetime with the Republican Party, so this is very significant,” Hawley said. “For the Republican Party to be a true majority party — not just win elections here and there but be a majority party — we have to be the party of working people, the party of blue-collar workers. And that reality is slowly starting to be understood.”
O’Brien’s call for Republicans to shift policy to better support blue-collar workers won support from at least one delegate: Ed Cox, a financial lawyer and chairman of the New York State Republican Party. Mr. Cox described himself as “probably one of the guys who negotiated with the unions in that conference center.” He said O’Brien is on board with the paradigm shift that Mr. Trump has signaled he wants to see.
“Trump has been very consistent,” Cox said. “This is not a small change.”
Isaac Arnsdorf and Azi Paybarah contributed to this report.
