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For all the shots that former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee (R) has taken at Wall Street and soaring executive pay on the campaign trail, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce seems unfazed about the prospect of a Huckabee White House.
“My own view is we ought to listen carefully to what the governor is saying — he touches on notes that are worthy of attention,” said the Chamber’s president and chief executive, Tom Donohue, responding to reporters’ questions about Huckabee’s chances.
But that’s as far as Donohue would go. He added that populist promises — such as the anti-trade positions Huckabee has staked out on the campaign trail — rarely hold up under the pressures of governance. “While it might sound like great fun to say we should withdraw from the global economy — it’s not going to work and it’s not very smart,” he said.
A former Baptist minister who has said he wouldn’t be a “wholly owned subsidiary of Wall Street,” Huckabee has strained the uneasy alliance between the GOP’s social conservatives and the party’s wealthy business wing. His insurgent victory over former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney (R), a former financier, in the Iowa caucuses underscores the appeal of his message to many GOP voters.
Huckabee’s record of raising taxes as governor of Arkansas has invited the wrath of the free-market Club for Growth, which ran ads against him in Iowa and plans to do so in South Carolina. Yet Huckabee has mollified some would-be critics with his support of the “Fair Tax,” a plan to replace the income tax with a national retail sales tax, and by signing a pledge to the Americans for Tax Reform saying that he wouldn’t raise taxes as president.
That may not be enough to convince the staunchest anti-tax advocates. Former House Majority Leader Dick Armey (R-Texas), the president of Freedom Works, on Tuesday penned a withering rebuke of Huckabee’s economic rhetoric and policies on the website RealClearPolitics.org.
The U.S. Chamber does not intervene directly in White House races. However, it seeks to sway voter opinion through its political action committee, which pours money into pivotal congressional races throughout the country.
This year, the Chamber will be more aggressive than ever, according to Donohue, intervening in some 144 congressional districts to support pro-business candidates: “We will run the most comprehensive program of voter education, get-out-the-vote, and political action in our history.”
He added that the Chamber’s goal is to contrast free-market, pro-trade positions with those the group deems harmful to the economy. “Our role is going to be very clear: to stimulate that debate, to ask those questions,” he said.
The Chamber’s top lobbyist, Bruce Josten, predicted that the fiery campaign rhetoric was bound to die down after the primary. “You have to separate out trying to win a nomination and governing.”
He also cast doubt on the notion that a populist candidate could win the White House, perhaps a foreboding message for Huckabee: “Name me a time when a candidate who ran on populist rhetoric was elected president.” |
