Column: Box Inc CEO Levie makes the business case for Kamala Harris: Ross Kerber

Box

23/10/2024 13:00

(The opinions expressed here are those of the author, a
columnist for Reuters. This column is part of the weekly Reuters
Sustainable Finance newsletter, which you can sign up for here)
    By Ross Kerber
       Oct 23 (Reuters) - The U.S. presidential election poses
fraught questions for U.S. business leaders, who traditionally
backed the Republican party for its policies like lower
corporate taxes.
    No longer. Research from a Yale University institute shows
that hardly any Fortune 100 CEOs have contributed to Republican
former President Donald Trump's campaign, with the notable
exception of Tesla's  TSLA.O  Elon Musk. Yale polling showed 80%
of CEOs expect U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris to win the Nov.
5 contest.
    Most business leaders, "across parties, are by and large
horrified by Trump’s leadership model and his incendiary
rhetoric," wrote Yale's Jeffrey Sonnenfeld.
    Harris has gotten business support despite a proposal to
raise the corporate tax rate to 28% from 21%. Backers include
Yelp  YELP.N  CEO Jeremy Stoppelman and Evercore  EVR.N  founder
Roger Altman. Yesterday it was reported that JPMorgan  JPM.N 
CEO Jamie Dimon would consider a role such as Treasury Secretary
in a Harris administration.
    Yet it's still hard to parse out exactly where the largest
company CEOs stand from their public statements and those of top
trade groups, which avoid picking sides.
    To make sense of things I spoke with Harris supporter Aaron
Levie, CEO of cloud content management platform Box Inc  BOX.N ,
on Monday. Here is a transcript of our conversation, edited for
length and clarity:
    
    Q: A lot of big names came out for Harris but you were the
rare public company CEO. Have you heard from some investors who
say you're in the public market and should stay neutral per your
fiduciary duty? 
    
    A: I've heard people disagree with my views or agree with
them, but nobody has brought up fiduciary duties. I'd argue it's
my civic duty to be able to share my thoughts as I see fit.
There's a variety of business policies that will inevitably get
decided by this or any other administration.
    
    Q: Am I right you are the rare CEO of a publicly-traded
company who has weighed in?
    
    A: I'm not tracking it at the statistical level but I think
it's directionally correct that it's more rare than not. Part of
it is the culture of Silicon Valley, we're all pretty online,
very used to sharing views on a variety of topics online, so
probably the behavior of this industry is to be outspoken. 
    
    Q: Have you gotten any blowback, either from Trump-favoring
customers or otherwise?
    
    A: Not that's reached my desk. I try to remain very business
focused and hopefully professional about it. I have respect for
voters on all sides.
    
    Q; Tell me why you're for Harris and what concerns you have
about Trump?
    
    A: On the Trump side you often saw an increase of volatile
policies and a variety of distractions when we look at the first
four years. I had a really hard time trying to push through
conversations about high-skill immigration because there was a
constantly changing landscape around immigration in America. I
thought that was bad for business. 
    Conversely with Harris, I think she's surrounded herself
with strategic policy folks. I think she has strong connections
to Silicon Valley. I think she's going to take seriously a large
set of technology policy issues, whether its AI or bringing back
more chip manufacturing to America, or how to create the next
generation of jobs in a lot of these advanced industries.  
Driving a pro-business agenda while also being thoughtful about
a lot of the social policies that need to come along with that.
My view is that she offers a thoughtful, levelheaded strategic
approach to many of these topics.
    
    Q: There are analysts who see Trump as an authoritarian
threat to capitalism. They say Trump would be bad for business
because there are rule-of-law questions when he is attacking
individual companies or threatening the independence of the Fed.
Is that part of your thinking? 
    
    A: Not as much. I'm sympathetic to some of those arguments,
I'm probably more optimistic about all the various
counterbalances that the system has. I default to the view that
Trump very much exaggerates and has a lot of hyperbole in his
commentary. I do think that creates distraction and disruption.
Businesses want to be able to operate in stable landscape.
    
    Q: There are studies about the impact of his Tweets from the
first term, where he'd attack a company and that would push down
its share price for a few days, then it would come back up. So
there may be sentiment that everything will be the same. The
counter-argument is that all the grownups in the room are gone.
    
    A: I've heard that argument. It's not totally clear to me
how that plays out. The main point I'd make is that you want a
wide range of ideas to be put out there and you want feedback on
those ideas. That's not only how our democracy works and
thrives, I think it's essential.

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CEO contributions to Republicans tail off    https://reut.rs/48g7ney
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 (Reporting by Ross Kerber; Editing by David Gregorio)
 ((ross.kerber@thomsonreuters.com; (617) 412 0093;))