Former American Express CEO Ken Chenault said CEOs were forced to stay quiet when speaking about former President Donald Trump for fear of retaliation.
“The fear is real,” Chenault said. Bloomberg A lengthy article detailing President Trump's economic policies.
Chenault, now chairman of venture capital firm General Catalyst, argued that executives feared there would be backlash if they said anything negative about Trump.
“People are so scared that there will be retaliation that they are sitting on the sidelines,” Chenault said.
Chenault did not respond to a request for comment. A General Catalyst spokesman said Chenault was speaking as an individual. “General Catalyst does not endorse any presidential candidate,” it said in an emailed statement. “As a company, we will work with any presidential administration.”
Throughout his presidential campaign, Trump has repeatedly said he would retaliate against his opponents if elected. Like Chenault, Trump has used the word “retaliation” many times. Shortly after his conviction on 34 felony counts of financial fraud in connection with hush money payments to porn actress Stormy Daniels during the 2016 election, Trump praised the idea of revenge in an interview with TV host Dr. Phil. “Sometimes revenge is justified,” Trump said.
The Trump campaign did not respond to a request for comment.
Most of Trump's threats have been directed at his political opponents, whom he has said he has “every right” to prosecute. But he also has no end of antipathy toward certain business leaders. In particular, he has been open about his dislike for Silicon Valley executives, with Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Amazon founder and chairman Jeff Bezos being his favorite targets. Zuckerberg has frequently incurred his ire since Meta's decision to ban him from Facebook and Instagram after a mob of his supporters stormed the Capitol on January 6, 2021. Meta lifted the ban in February 2023.
In Trump's eyes, that has done little to repair the relationship. Last week, the Republican candidate called Zuckerberg an “election fraudster” and threatened to jail him after baselessly accusing the Meta CEO of rigging the US election. “Don't do that! Watch out, Mr. Zuckerberg!” Trump wrote on his social media platform, TruthSocial.
Meanwhile, Bezos earned the Trump-esque nickname “Jeff Bozo” in a 2019 post on X (then Twitter). The trouble between the two began when Bezos opposed Trump's 2017 Muslim immigration ban. The Washington PostHis frequent questioning of Trump's reporting on his administration also didn't help the tech billionaire curry favor with the former president.
Beyond personal animosity and the threat of political retaliation (worrisome in themselves), business leaders are also worried about the substance of Trump's economic policies. Trump has stated on multiple occasions that he wants to impose tariffs of 60% on Chinese goods and 10% on other foreign goods. For top executives of Fortune 500 companies, the idea of paying 10% more for the products their expanding companies need from other countries could mean extreme financial hardship. Economists widely expect Trump to cause inflation if he is successful in implementing his policies. All of his policies have also led Trump allies to float plans to reduce the independence of the Federal Reserve, which business leaders balked at, according to The Economic Journal. The Wall Street Journal.
Yale University professor Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, who has close ties to major CEOs, has been a sharp critic of Trump in recent weeks over policies he believes will hurt American companies. “In these positions, Trump seems more like Karl Marx than Adam Smith,” Sonnenfeld wrote in an article. The New York Times An editorial published last month.
But many CEOs seem to think Trump's reelection is likely, so they made the traditional executive pilgrimage to visit presidential candidates. A meeting in June between former President Donald Trump and a group of top CEOs left both sides with conflicting impressions. According to CNBC, the CEOs (who spoke anonymously) told their advisers that Trump is “amazingly disorganized” and “can't think straight.”
Trump, meanwhile, told Bloomberg that the meeting was a “love fest” and that he was not only blessed by the business leaders but praised, admired and worshipped.
