By Chip Cutter and Emily Glazer
In the wake of the riot at the Capitol, companies moved to cut
ties with President Trump and his supporters and fired workers who
participated.
Facebook Inc. banned Mr. Trump indefinitely and Canada-based
Shopify Inc. closed online stores associated with Mr. Trump's
campaign and businesses. Publisher Simon & Schuster said it
would drop a coming book by Sen. Josh Hawley, a key backer of Mr.
Trump's election claims. Dozens more executives and trade groups
denounced the takeover of the Capitol and called for the removal of
the president.
A number of companies said they fired employees who participated
in the riot at the Capitol after seeing employees in photos and
videos posted to social media.
Goosehead Insurance said Thursday that Paul Davis, an associate
general counsel, was no longer employed by the company. In an email
to employees Thursday, Goosehead CEO Mark Jones said the company
was "surprised and dismayed to learn that one of our employees,
without our knowledge or support, participated in a violent
demonstration at our nation's capital yesterday." A spokesman for
Goosehead, a publicly traded company based in Westlake, Texas, said
Mr. Davis had been hired in mid-2020.
On an Instagram account, a user identified as Paul M. Davis
wrote that he was "peacefully demonstrating" Wednesday. The
account, public earlier Thursday, is now private; Mr. Davis didn't
return a request for comment.
Managers at Navistar Direct Marketing, a printing company in
Frederick, Md., saw on Twitter that a man wearing a company badge
was among rioters inside the U.S. Capitol. After reviewing photos,
the company said the employee had been "terminated for cause."
"While we support all employees' right to peaceful, lawful
exercise of free speech, any employee demonstrating dangerous
conduct that endangers the health and safety of others will no
longer have an employment opportunity with Navistar Direct
Marketing," the company said. A spokesman for the company declined
to name the employee.
In most states, employers have wide latitude to terminate
employees, even for conduct outside the workplace.
Ron Shaich, former CEO of Panera Bread Co. and an investor in
several other chains who's involved in No Labels, a political group
that supports centrist lawmakers, said executives have the right to
fire workers believed to have engaged in illegal activities.
"There's not unlimited freedom," he said, adding that if one of
his employees had illegally entered the U.S. Capitol, he would fire
them. "I'm not going to tell you you shouldn't go to a Trump
demonstration and you shouldn't be in our company if you vote for
Trump, but that's not the same," he said. "We as a society have got
to repudiate this. This is not OK."
Dave Petratis, CEO of Allegion PLC, a security products
manufacturer with U.S. headquarters in the Indianapolis area, said
he supported a statement from the National Association of
Manufacturers that suggested Vice President Mike Pence consider
invoking the 25th Amendment to remove the president from
office.
"The middle, the saner part of America and the world's got to
step up and say: Enough," he said, adding that this week's events
make him want to speak out more forcefully. "It just primes and
motivates me for action."
Companies might also face a backlash. The Lincoln Project, a
group of anti-Trump Republicans and former Republicans, said it's
planning "a brutal corporate pressure campaign" targeting
companies, trade associations, CEOs and others that "serve as the
financiers of the Authoritarian movement that attacked the US
Capitol," Steve Schmidt, a political strategist and a co-founder of
the Lincoln Project, said in a tweet.
In an interview Thursday evening, Mr. Schmidt said he wasn't
ready to list specific companies that will be in the crosshairs,
but said the Lincoln Project thinks there are plenty worth
scrutinizing.
"It's a time for choosing: it's America, or autocracy," he said.
"There's going to be a public discussion around it."
Rich Lesser, CEO of Boston Consulting Group, said the business
community must be clear-eyed about President Trump's behavior, as
well as those members of Congress who acted as enablers. "If we
look past these actions and treat them as an isolated event by
engaging and supporting these individuals, then we also risk being
complicit in encouraging future actions that destabilize our
country," he said. Mr. Lesser didn't suggest specific actions
businesses should take, but said companies have an important role
to play.
More calls for removing the president came from groups as varied
as National Nurses United, which represents 170,000 nurses in the
U.S., and law firm Crowell & Moring LLP, which has about 1,100
employees. The Washington, D.C.-based law firm urged other firm
leaders and lawyers to add their support to the firm's letter. "The
president has proven himself unfit for office, and a reckless and
wanton threat to the Constitution that he pledged to preserve,
protect, and defend," the firm said.
Crowell & Moring Chairman Phil Inglima, a Democrat, said
that since the firm shared the letter, he's heard from several
leaders of law firms of different sizes who want to participate. He
said the firm, which has support from Republicans and Democrats
internally, plans to send the letter to Mr. Pence this week.
One CEO who has been a major Trump donor said that he was
frustrated by the violence and wished the president more forcefully
disavowed the rioters' actions, though he also said Mr. Trump had
been maligned by opponents and the media throughout his term. The
CEO said he no longer plans to financially support Mr. Trump's
future political ambitions.
Some other business leaders continue to stand with Mr. Trump and
the Republican senators. John Lodge III, CEO of Lodge Lumber Co. in
Houston, said he remains a supporter, personally and financially,
of Mr. Trump and Sen. Ted Cruz, who objected Wednesday night to
ratifying Mr. Biden's electoral college votes in Arizona.
Mr. Lodge said he thinks the violence was staged to make Trump
supporters look bad.
"I support everyone who supports the president and Ted Cruz," he
said, adding that he has a list of people who don't support the
president and they won't get money from him in the next election,
whether Republican or Democrat.
--Khadeeja Safdar, Sharon Terlep and Kathryn Dill contributed to
this article.
Write to Chip Cutter at chip.cutter@wsj.com and Emily Glazer at
emily.glazer@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
January 07, 2021 21:01 ET (02:01 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2021 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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