Cathie Wood says she will vote for Donald Trump in the election

ARK Invest CEO Cathie Wood said she plans to vote for Trump because of his record on the economy — the single most important issue to her, she said during an interview with YouTuber Kevin Paffrath.

Wood said she has discussed the issue with her three children, who are divided on who they will cast their vote for.

“As I’ve told them, ‘Look, I’m going to vote for the person who’s going to do the best job for our economy,'” Wood said. “I’m a voter when it comes to the economy, and on that basis, Trump.”

The interview with Wood was originally posted on Paffrath’s X page, but he has since taken it down. In a post explaining why, Paffrath says Wood later told him her remarks did not adequately represent the nuance of her political views. Paffrath went on to say that he felt he would “ambushed” Wood with the question of which candidate she would support in the upcoming presidential election. After backlash from Wood’s team, Paffrath wrote that he interpreted Wood’s explanation to mean “there’s more to a vote than economics.”

He then apologized to Wood. “We are sorry to have disappointed you,” Paffrath continued.

ARK Invest did not respond to a request for comment.

A well-known technology investor, Wood made a name for herself in financial circles by hooking up with another famous and polarizing figure in Elon Musk. ARK Invest was an early investor and evangelist of Tesla, whose high stock price made it a fortune.

The former president’s support among the corporate class has been the subject of much discussion as he taps into their deep pockets in what is expected to be an extremely tight race. Trump reportedly met with a group of energy CEOs and offered them a slew of favorable legislation in exchange for $1 billion in campaign financing. Wall Street CEOs in particular have warmed up to Trump again, as they embraced him after the Capitol riots on Jan. 6, 2021, according to Wall Street Journal.

However, other CEOs are still at a distance, wary of Trump’s proposed 10% tariffs on all imports and his disdain for global trade deals. Yale business school professor Jeffrey Sonnenfeld told CNBC on Monday that there was a “historic disconnect” between corporate America and Trump.

Another Trump presidency would feature more tax cuts

Trump still retains support among some Republican supporters. During her interview, Wood paraphrased comments from Art Laffer, an economist who worked in the Reagan administration, in which he said Trump was the best president in a century for the economy until the pandemic hit. “I would agree,” Wood told Paffrath.

Laffer, a noted critic of Biden, is also known for popularizing the Laffer curve, which suggests that lowering taxes at a certain rate can actually increase government revenue. He is often cited for cutting taxes on corporations and those in the highest tax brackets. But the accuracy of the Laffer curve is often debated.

The ideas behind the Laffer curve provided justification for the Trump-era tax cuts passed in 2017. Those cuts — officially known as the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act — were the signature economic policy and legislative achievement of the Trump presidency. A study from March found that while the bill boosted investment, it did not do so at a level that would offset the large drop in tax revenue. Instead, the bill added $100 billion a year to the US national debt.

If he were to win the election in November, Trump would extend previous tax cuts and implement further cuts. “When President Trump returns to the White House, he will champion more tax cuts for all Americans and revive America’s energy industry to lower inflation, lower the cost of living and pay down our debt.” , Trump campaign press secretary Caroline Leavitt said. said in an emailed statement.

During the campaign, he proposed a series of policies that would eliminate most, if not all, income taxes and replace them with tariffs on all imported goods. This idea, far outside the usual bounds of economic policy, would lead to “the mother of stagflation,” according to former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers.

For his part, Biden has overseen a record labor market with an unemployment streak below 4%, the longest since the 1960s, helped by a series of legislative packages aimed at stimulating both public and private sector spending. private. And while inflation remains above the Fed’s 2% target, it is well below the June 2022 growth rate of 9%.

But Wood has said she is worried about deflation in 2024 and warned that unemployment could rise above 5%. “I’m saying that now knowing that this is an election year and that this administration is probably going to try to spend more than is currently in the budget through executive order or what have you,” she told Bloomberg earlier this year.