Donors: It’s time to rally behind Governor Haley. Don’t wait until it’s too late.
From today’s Wall Street Journal:
Big hitters on Wall Street are lining up to support Nikki Haley’s long-shot bid to snatch the 2024 Republican presidential nomination from Donald Trump.
“There’s a desperate, desperate hunt for anybody but Trump,” said one of the roughly 30 senior executives The Wall Street Journal spoke with to gauge the mood of the finance set roughly a year ahead of the election.
While Wall Street’s die-hard Democrats are sticking with President Biden, many other financiers have been casting about for an alternative to Trump, the former president they see as too unpredictable among other concerns. […]
Attention on Haley, a former South Carolina governor and Trump’s former U.N. ambassador, intensified after Sen. Tim Scott’s (R., S.C.) unexpected exit Sunday.
Former Trump adviser Gary Cohn and UBS banker Mike Santini co-hosted a Haley fundraiser Tuesday at Cohn’s Upper East Side apartment in Manhattan. Roughly 30 guests including Aryeh Bourkoff, the founder of investment bank LionTree, paid $10,000 apiece to attend.
Haley fielded questions on topics including trade relations, economic policy and abortion. She won plaudits at last week’s Republican debate for finessing her stance on the abortion issue and calling for consensus.
Other Haley events in New York are set for Dec. 3 and Dec. 4, with the latter being organized by Santini, litigator Eric Levine and others, some of whom have ties to Elliott Management, the $60 billion hedge fund founded by Republican donor Paul Singer. They include Campbell Brown, the Meta Platforms executive and wife of Elliott public affairs chief Dan Senor, and Terry Kassel, a longtime Haley supporter who is Elliott’s human-resources head and Singer’s girlfriend. (Singer himself is still entertaining supporting candidates including Haley, DeSantis and former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie.)
And not just Republicans. Also from the same WSJ article:
Haley, 51 years old, who already has high-profile admirers including outgoing Morgan Stanley CEO James Gorman, has been busy this week charming others including JPMorgan Chase’s Jamie Dimon and BlackRock’s Larry Fink. The conversation between Haley and Dimon was earlier reported by Axios.
Dimon, who leans Democratic, has told people Haley seems to understand the business world and could get things done. That tacit endorsement is rare for Wall Street’s elder statesman, as he doesn’t typically signal support for candidates. Fink saw Haley on Tuesday at a meet-and-greet with other executives.
Ken Griffin, the founder of investing giant Citadel and one of the biggest Republican donors, meanwhile, is flirting with throwing his support behind Haley, telling Bloomberg this week he was “actively contemplating” it. Blackstone CEO Stephen Schwarzman is also still considering his options.
So far, so good. But here’s an example of a major problem:
“If she passes DeSantis, she’s the backup,” said one financier who supports her. Given Trump’s legal troubles, “it’s not completely crazy that she could ultimately win.”
Major donors should not wait until Iowa. They should not until January. They should not wait until December.
To establish a stronger position in Iowa and New Hampshire, Governor Haley needs more resources right now. Haley clearly has momentum. But the GOP’s major donors rallying to her en masse would be a major boost in both resources and momentum.
The longer major donors continue to feel out their options and sit on the fence, the higher the likelihood that President Trump wins the 2024 nomination.
I argued in my September Project Syndicate column that Governor Haley has the right stuff to beat Trump for the GOP nomination and to beat President Biden in the general election. In the months since, that has become even more self evident.
This is an all-hands-on-deck moment for the political right. I wrote here three weeks ago:
Leaders on the right need to do all they can to deny Trump the nomination. That requires giving primary voters a real choice between Trump and one alternative.
Haley is clearly in the best position to beat Trump for the nomination and to beat Biden for the presidency. The more voters focus on her, the more they want to see her sitting in the Oval Office as president. The remaining GOP candidates need to follow Pence’s [and Scott’s] lead and put country before personal political ambition. They need to stop obscuring the view of the candidate most likely to win.
I repeat: Donors: It’s time to rally behind Governor Haley. Don’t wait until it’s too late.
Donors Are Leaning Towards Haley. It’s (Past) Time for Them to Go All In
5
0
18.11.2023
Donors: It’s time to rally behind Governor Haley. Don’t wait until it’s too late.
From today’s Wall Street Journal:
Big hitters on Wall Street are lining up to support Nikki Haley’s long-shot bid to snatch the 2024 Republican presidential nomination from Donald Trump.
“There’s a desperate, desperate hunt for anybody but Trump,” said one of the roughly 30 senior executives The Wall Street Journal spoke with to gauge the mood of the finance set roughly a year ahead of the election.
While Wall Street’s die-hard Democrats are sticking with President Biden, many other financiers have been casting about for an alternative to Trump, the former president they see as too unpredictable among other concerns. […]
Attention on Haley, a former South Carolina governor and Trump’s former U.N. ambassador, intensified after Sen. Tim Scott’s (R., S.C.) unexpected exit Sunday.
Former Trump adviser Gary Cohn and UBS banker Mike Santini co-hosted a Haley fundraiser Tuesday at Cohn’s Upper East Side apartment in Manhattan. Roughly 30 guests including Aryeh Bourkoff, the founder of investment bank LionTree, paid $10,000 apiece to attend.
Haley........
© National Review
visit website
login
who are we?
contact us
qosheapp
Toi Staff
Gideon Levy
Belen Fernandez
Andrew Mitrovica
Mort Laitner
Ali Fathollah-Nejad
Rami G Khouri
Nikkei Editorial
