Ahead of the US elections happening in November this year, new data from the Yale School of Management showed that none of the Fortune 500 CEOs are willing to support the presidential candidacy of former President Donald Trump. This, despite the latter recently holding a private meeting with 80 CEOs of some of America’s biggest companies.
Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, who first shared the data in The New York Times, noted that CEOs favour investing where there is the “rule of law, not the rule of rulers.”
Donations Haven’t Recovered Ever Since
According to the data (via Axios), since Trump became the Republican nominee in 2016, donations from the country’s CEOs haven’t recovered yet. The same scenario happened when Trump went head-to-head with Democrat nominee Hillary Clinton in 2016.
While Trump managed to get two CEO supporters in 2020, no prominent vocal Fortune 500 CEOs have shown support for Trump in this upcoming election.
“They didn’t flock to him before and certainly aren’t flocking to him now. Mr. Trump continues to suffer from the lowest level of corporate support in the history of the Republican Party,” Sonnenfield said.
In a subsequent interview with CNBC, Sonnenfield also clarified that the previous reports of Trump meeting with US CEOs was him attending a quarterly meeting of The Business Roundtable (BRT), a non-profit lobbyist association whose members also included CEOs. Current president Joe Biden was also invited at the time, but he attended this year’s G7 summit at Apulia, Italy.
He also said in the interview that much of the fallout amongst Fortune 500 CEOs stems from increased protectionist, isolationist or xenophobic acts that are driven by Trump’s ideologies, ranging from white supremacy rallies in Charlottesville, Virginia, to the January 6 United States Capitol attack in 2021.
There Is More Choice Out There
While Sonnenfield said that Trump has yet to get the support of Fortune 500 companies, there is also a possibility of top bankers in the country showing their support instead, including Steve Schwarzman of Blackstone.
Moreover, many CEOs still greatly oppose choosing Biden, primarily due to the administration’s antitrust policies and support for stronger capital gains taxes. However, many CEOs are still optimistic about supporting Biden in the next run.
“Nobody’s saying that the Biden policies are perfect, and there are some problems. But they are dwarfed by the pernicious threat to inflation, economic stability, and, most importantly, democracy presented by the prospective Trump presidency,” Sonnenfield told Fortune in a separate interview.
Some CEOs who have supported Biden include American philanthropist Melinda French Gates, Skydance CEO David Ellison (son of Larry Ellison, the founder of Oracle), and Reed Hastings, chairman of the board of Netflix.
Sonnenfield also noted that during his private conversations with some CEOs, many “despise” Trump’s social and fiscal policies. Some of those heads included heads of PepsiCo, Ford, UPS, Verizon, and IBM, to name a few.
While corporate America has been relatively silent on which side they are on, big financial firms are already planning what either candidate will likely support once they win. A recent market outlook published by J.P. Morgan noted that while the candidates don’t directly impact the stock market’s performance, they are forecasting similarities and contrasts between the two prominent candidates.
For instance, while the market expects robust spending on defence companies to continue to rise on whoever wins the race, oil and gas investments will see more significance under Trump’s rule. In contrast, renewable energy will see more investment under Biden’s administration.
Shelby Anderson, Executive Director of J.P. Morgan Wealth Management Wealth Planning & Advice, said, “Don’t let that emotion get the best of you. Make sure that you are creating a plan – that you are revisiting it often or periodically, especially as life circumstances change – but not letting the emotion in what can seem like a very stressful time leading up to elections really drive our decision-making.”
