President-elect Trump and Vice President-elect Mike Pence have encouraged the business community in the early going, the head of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce declared Wednesday morning.
Delivering an address at the business lobby’s headquarters across a park from the White House, chamber CEO Thomas Donohue said that “so far, we’re encouraged by the strong emphasis that President-elect Trump, Vice President-elect Pence, and the House and Senate leadership have placed on economic growth as a priority.”
Donohue’s blessing of the Trump transition during his annual speech was part of a larger roll-out that included a print op-ed and a television appearance of the business group’s plan to work with the Republican majority.
That approach was not always the obvious path forward. During the GOP primary, Donohue criticized Trump’s stances on trade and immigration, two perennial top concerns for businesses.
But Trump appears to have allayed those fears by choosing business-friendly advisers and penciling in major tax cut and infrastructure spending efforts.
Nevertheless, Donohue indicated that the group remains worried about the prospect of new trade barriers in a Trump administration. Especially given the possibility of a stronger dollar crimping exports, “it is important that the new administration does not add to the burdens facing our exporters — or to the millions of American workers whose jobs depend on exports — by erecting barriers to trade.”
He also called for “a serious deliberation” on achieving the business and diplomatic goals of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, the major Pacific-nation trade agreement negotiated by President Obama that Trump ran against.
