Can the G.O.P. Really Become the Party of Workers?

The most surprising moment of this year’s Republican National Convention may have come on its first night, when the president of the Teamsters railed in prime time against corporate elites and denounced a “war against labor” by business groups. The gasps from some in the hall were almost audible on television.

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“It’s like what Kamala Harris might say — it allowed a discussion of what could be, unburdened by the past,” quipped Oren Cass, a former policy aide to Senator Mitt Romney whose think tank, American Compass, pushes Republicans to adopt more a populist economic agenda. Launched in 2020, American Compass advocates not just policies in the Trumpian sweet spot — like higher tariffs — but also those that would directly shift power to workers, like enabling more of them to bargain collectively with employers.

“The economic nationalism on the trade and globalization side created actual space to do pro-worker policy,” Mr. Cass said.

After President Biden took office, mainstream Democrats emphasized a similar combination of economic nationalism and worker-centric policies. Many Republicans seemed to feel a political imperative to follow suit. Republican senators like Mr. Rubio, Mr. Hawley, Tom Cotton of Arkansas and later Mr. Vance, who had been exploring some of these ideas, built on proposals informed by American Compass and like-minded groups, and even a few labor unions.