Donald Trump’s populism is turning off corporate donors

“GO WOKEGOPACCEOSPPAC, broke,” intone Republicans fed up with socially aware American firms. But it is the politicians who are paying for their own ideological zeal. In 2000 and 2004 corporate political-action committees (s) gave them twice as much as they gave Democrats. After divvying up donations nearly evenly between the two parties in 2008 (perhaps thanks to a charismatic newcomer named Barack Obama), in 2012 and 2016 they favoured Republican candidates again, by a factor of nearly two to one. Company bosses, too, preferred conservatives. A paper in 2019 found that between 2000 and 2017 s of firms in the & 1500 index directed two-thirds of their giving to the right.In the 2019-20 election cycle, by contrast, corporate donations to Republicans fell by a quarter, compared with four years earlier. One explanation is that donors were unhappy with the party’s populist shift away from trade, immigration and international co-operation. After Mr Trump’s supporters stormed the Capitol on January 6th 2021, dozens of firms halted donations to Republican lawmakers who voted against certifying Joe Biden’s 2020 election win. According to Jeffrey Sonnenfeld of the Yale School of Management, more than three-quarters of these firms were still withholding such donations a year later.