The largest conservative caucus in the House embraced Florida Sen. Marco Rubio’s argument in favor of populistlike economic policies on Wednesday, marking one of the clearest signs yet of the Republican Party shifting ideologically away from free-market evangelism.
In a speech to a closed-door Republican Study Committee lunch on Wednesday, Rubio argued for challenging “the orthodoxy that the market’s always right” in what he has called “common-good capitalism.”
“That was probably true when what was good for a big corporation was automatically good for America. That’s not necessarily the case anymore,” Rubio said. “I’m not against big corporations. I think they’re an important part of our economy. But I’m not blind to the fact that their CEO considers themselves a citizen of the world. And for them, it doesn’t matter to make a billion dollars employing someone in Indiana or a billion dollars employing someone in India.”
Rubio has taken many positions recently that put this evolved economic framework into action, including by supporting an Amazon worker unionization push and measures to support domestic investment while countering China’s influence.
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Members attended the lunch just hours after House Republicans voted to remove Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney as conference chairwoman following frustration with her outspoken criticism of former President Donald Trump’s claims that the 2020 election was stolen.
Their embrace of Rubio’s argument, though, could be a demonstration that the former president’s impact on the party is not simply a cult of personality that prompts internal power struggles but a substantive shift in ideology.
Indiana Rep. Jim Banks, chairman of the Republican Study Committee, had high praise for Rubio.
“This is a new moment in the conservative movement,” Banks said. “I don’t believe that anyone has captured it, or articulated better about where the movement is going, better than Sen. Rubio has in the Senate.”
“The challenge we have as conservatives, as Republicans, is we believe in the market. The market is the most efficient allocator of capital the world has ever known and the biggest eradicator of poverty in the world has ever known,” Rubio said. “But what happens when the market outcome, as occurs from time to time, the most efficient outcome, is not in our national interest or runs counter to our national security? Because the market is pretty clear it is more efficient to buy basic pharmaceutical ingredients from China.”
“We’ve seen what happens when a major industry gets up and leaves,” Rubio continued. “And the people left behind are told, ‘Why don’t you go and learn how to code and move halfway across the country and leave behind your family and your support network and the life you’ve ever known?'”
“Know what happens? Divorce, the destruction of families, the erosion of community,” the potential 2024 GOP presidential hopeful added.
Rubio pointed to current levels of unemployment and reports of people declining to go back to work because of increased benefits from the government as an example of his point.
“These aren’t lazy people. These are logical human beings that are making a logical decision,” Rubio said. “But it’s corrosive. When you don’t have somewhere to go in the morning every day and be productive and provide for your family, it’s corrosive to the human spirit.”
So many members of the Republican Study Committee attended the event that they ran out of food. A room at the Capitol Hill Club, a temporary lunch meeting space due to COVID-19 constraints in the Capitol, was full, plus there was an overflow room. No member publicly challenged or disagreed with Rubio’s argument.
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“It cannot be the sort of traditional, ‘The market by itself will always be right,'” Rubio said. “It generally is. But when it reaches an outcome that’s bad for Americans or bad for America, then our challenge is to determine: What is the proper role of government? Not cronyism. Not, ‘Let’s put a bunch of money in this industry because a friend of mine from college runs it,’ or they hired the right lobbyist. But what are the right industries that America can partner with?”
He cited the Trump administration’s Operation Warp Speed as a good example of the government partnering with private industry.
