J.D. Vance Pick Unnerves GOP’s Business Elite, Thrills Populists

Former president Donald Trump’s choice of Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio) as the GOP’s vice-presidential nominee reflects the ascendancy of the party’s populist economic wing — and the choice is alarming traditional conservative policymakers and elite donors who opposed the pick.

…

The first-term senator has embraced a more active role for government intervention in the economy than most Republicans, emerging as a leader of a minority faction among GOP senators that also includes Sens. Josh Hawley (Mo.) and Marco Rubio (Fla.). Vance has praised President Biden’s antitrust crusader at the Federal Trade Commission, called for a higher minimum wage and even once called for raising taxes on corporations — all positions anathema to conservatives. The departure is particularly stark compared with the vice president of Trump’s first term, Mike Pence, who branded himself as an adherent of Ronald Reagan by embodying GOP orthodoxy on issues ranging from deficits to taxes, or former House speaker Paul D. Ryan, another GOP vice-presidential nominee known for his free-market orthodoxy.

“It’s clear to most leaders of the party that the future will be the Vances, the Hawleys and the Rubios — to have one of them be on the ticket is a very significant marker, or in some ways validation, of the direction the Republican Party is now heading on key economic issues,” said Oren Cass, a Vance ally and president of American Compass, a think tank closely tied to the economic populists in the GOP. “Vance articulates a very clear perspective on the failure of what he’ll call the ‘market fundamentalism’ of the GOP — the consensus economic policy of the last few decades.”

…

Alarm over Vance’s connection to Cass’s American Compass group and support for FTC Chairwoman Lina Khan has spread among top business executives and donors, said one senior business figure, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to share candid opinions. Vance said earlier this year that Khan is “doing a pretty good job,” citing the FTC crackdown on tech giants.