When President Donald J. Trump left office, some of the Wall Street bigwigs who had warmed to him during his first term in the White House vowed to distance themselves from him for good. They were disgusted by his leadership style, disappointed by some of his policies, and shocked by the riot at the U.S. Capitol. Some of them even publicly abused him.
The disgust they described did not last long. As Mr. Trump leads in the polls, big capitalists on Wall Street and Silicon Valley are starting to corner him, according to interviews with more than a dozen people who requested anonymity because they didn't want their personal views tied to their views. It became clear. to their employers.
The motivations are wide-ranging. In many cases, they're not so much enthusiastic about Trump (as one hedge fund billionaire said, “I still hate this guy”), but rather President Biden's economic and immigration policies. I'm angry about it. In other cases, Trump's support for his return reflects growing dissatisfaction with what many big Wall Street donors see as a hardening of the White House's stance on Israel in the Gaza war. are doing.
A notable example of a change in attitude is Kenneth Griffin, the hedge fund mogul and political mega-donor who publicly derided Trump as a “three-time loser” less than two years ago. In recent weeks, Citadel's founders have been in touch with the former president's campaign about the possibility of making a large donation, amounting to millions of dollars.
Asked by The New York Times whether he would support Trump for the first time in 2024, Griffin said: “That's something I'm seriously considering.”
Mr. Griffin said in an interview with Bloomberg News on Tuesday that Mr. Trump “will exert a level of power” that will help, among other things, resolve foreign policy issues.
Griffin and his representatives told the Trump campaign that Griffin is waiting to see who the former president chooses as his running mate. He is hoping to elect someone with close ties to the traditional Republican establishment, such as former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley. Ms. Griffin donated millions of dollars to Ms. Haley's presidential bid after her unsuccessful Republican primary.
More than a dozen bankers, asset managers, hedge fund giants, lawyers and venture capitalists, including attendees of this month's $25,000-per-head Milken Institute Global Conference, said they were worried about Biden's economic policies and the country's borders. He said he was disappointed with the management policy. They asked that their names and titles be withheld so that they could share their opinions freely.
Their concerns reflect long-standing frustrations with inflation and the rise in illegal immigration, which have long been a drag on the president's approval ratings. But in recent days, some have grown increasingly weary of the various legal proceedings against Mr. Trump, not all of which involve the federal government, and of the Biden administration's signs of support for Israel in the Gaza conflict. There is.
The potential for increased support for Trump could be crucial for his campaign, given that his fundraising has lagged far behind Biden's. At the same time, given the president's political woes, any redirection of funds from the Biden campaign could hurt him further. Many big donors have balked at Biden's softening of his support for Israel, even as other voters want him to take a tougher stance on Israel. The invasion of Gaza.
Polling released this week by The New York Times, Siena College, and the Philadelphia Inquirer shows that young and nonwhite voters are leaving incumbents because they view their policies as too pro-Israel. It was shown that
The billionaire and billionaire political donors who are having second thoughts about Trump include not only longtime Republican supporters who are once again backing the party's nominee, but Trump's past two White House bids. That includes donors like Mr. Griffin, who avoided the former president.
In some ways, the wealthy are not that different from voters, as polls show Trump leading in most battleground states. These numbers have changed little since the end of last year. Also, big-name donors from all political walks of life often move to support leading candidates in elections.
In both 2016 and 2020, Trump's political base included few large corporations. In early 2021, big business leaders vocally opposed Mr. Trump's attempts to block the transfer of power. JPMorgan Chase, the nation's largest bank, suspended all political donations in response, and its chief executive, Jamie Dimon, said Trump was “letting the mob out.”
In January, Dimon told CNBC from the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, that Trump was on a number of issues, including taking a tougher stance on China and reversing his tough stance on China. “In a sense, I was right,'' he said, drawing the attention of Wall Street. Tax reduction. The bank's political action committee, which receives funding from employees including Mr. Dimon, has since resumed giving, giving more to Republicans than Democrats this election cycle.
Other Wall Street executives and political donors said in interviews that they felt Mr. Dimon's comments provided cover for more public support for Mr. Trump.
Mr. Dimon declined through his bank. We asked a spokesperson for more details, but spokesman Joe Evangelisti said that Dimon's claim was “just because 75 million fellow Americans agree with the presidential candidate's policies. We shouldn't be disrespectful to them.”
A Trump campaign spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment. A Biden campaign spokesperson cited the president's recent fundraising trip to the West Coast, saying he raised $10 million from Silicon Valley founders and executives.
There remains a gap between what some prominent businessmen say about Mr. Trump in public and private. Trump has challenged norms, vowing to investigate his political opponents if he returns to the Oval Office.
Last month, a group of tech heavyweights including Elon Musk, venture capitalist Marc Andreessen, and investor Peter Thiel met for dinner to discuss how best to oppose a second Biden term. said two people briefed on the matter. Newsletter “Pac'' first reported on the dinner party.
Mr. Andreessen, who once said Mr. Trump's immigration plan made him “sick to his stomach,” later told investors in the Middle East that he would not support Mr. Biden, one of the people briefed on the meeting said. said. This goes deeper than what Andreessen has said publicly.
A spokesperson for Mr. Andreessen declined to comment on these statements, saying he does not publicly take sides. “Mark always talks about current events in a casual manner, like any other normal human being,” said spokeswoman Margit Wennmachers.
Mr. Thiel, one of Mr. Trump's biggest supporters in 2016, has privately vented about Mr. Biden's management of the economy but said he had no intention of donating this time, according to a meeting with him. Topic, according to three people involved. But Thiel's data analytics company Palantir Technologies recently met with representatives of the Trump campaign to discuss the candidate's possible return to the White House, two people briefed on the sit-in said. .
The political environment also makes for strange bedfellows for Trump. Take Cliff Asness, a billionaire hedge fund manager and self-proclaimed liberal who earlier this year called the Republican Party under the former president a “cult.”
Asnes made the remarks last week after the White House suspended arms shipments to Israel to prevent them from being used in an attack on the densely populated Gaza city of Rafah. I wrote to X He said we were coming dangerously close to “a previously (and still) unthinkable situation: #TRUMP2024.”
