CEOs and Commanders in Chief

While the details of Elon Musk’s potential involvement in the next presidential administration remain to be seen and Trump’s transition team is led by Cantor Fitzgerald CEO Howard Lutnick, all involved in navigating the dynamics between government and corporate leaders would be wise to prep by reading a recently released book. 

As my Yeshiva University colleague, presidential historian and former White House official Tevi Troy, documents in his enthralling new volume “The Power and the Money: The Epic Clashes Between Commanders in Chief and Titans of Industry,” business leaders have been a source of both headaches and help for presidents – and in one particular case, a decades-long example of both.

Henry Ford, who brought cars to the masses, had a long history of antisemitism mixed with presidential politics. 

Ford was long known for his dislike of the Jewish people. He purchased the “Dearborn Independent” newspaper and used it to disseminate conspiracy theories about “the International Jew.” He even reprinted the notorious antisemitic tract “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.” As another historian, Hasia Diner, noted in an interview with PBS, “There are people who talked about him as a potential presidential candidate in the 1920s. Some local tavern keeper makes a antisemitic remark over the bar, well, nobody cares. Somebody may listen, and maybe repeat it, but it has a very limited span. But Henry Ford’s ability to gain a national audience with his words made him a very dangerous person.”

Though Ford’s reputation as a corporate titan took a hit, he was not “canceled,” to use today’s terminology. 

Troy notes that Ford even bears the dubious distinction of being the only American mentioned in Hitler’s “Mein Kampf.” Hitler told a reporter for The Chicago Tribune in 1924 that “We look to Heinrich Ford as the leader of the growing Fascist movement in America.”

Thankfully, presidents were among those who spoke out against Ford’s antisemitism. Presidents Taft, Wilson and Harding were among the signers of a statement by Ford critic John Webster Spargo, “The Perils of Racial Prejudice,” decrying his anti-Jewish animus. Jews started boycotting his products, in an effort to hit him where it hurts. It took until the late 1920s for Ford to pivot away from his public prejudices.

Around a decade later, however, in 1938, four months after the Nazis took over Austria, German officials awarded Ford the “Grand Cross of the German Eagle” in honor of his 75th birthday, an honor that he accepted. 

In response, Eddie Cantor, a renowned Jewish entertainer, denounced Ford publicly. Cantor questioned Ford’s Americanism “for accepting a citation from the biggest gangster in the world … Whose side is Mr. Ford on?” Cantor wondered. To this Ford had to issue a statement declaring “no sympathy on my part with Nazism” and that “those who have known me for many years realize that anything that breeds hate is repulsive to me.” 

Eventually, following a German bombing of a Ford plant in England and the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Ford positioned himself firmly on the side of the Allies. His bomber production facility in Willow Run, Michigan became legendary during WWII It employed 35,000 people who helped produce 9,000 B-24 Liberators, with $200 million of support from the U.S. government. The 975-acre factory was designed by Albert Kahn, Ford’s Jewish architect and frequent collaborator. FDR toured the facility in September of 1942, a few months after Ford received glowing coverage in TIME magazine, which labeled him a “fighting pacifist” who was crucial to the “miracle of war production.” 

In 1945, Ford viewed footage of the concentration camps for the first time. He ran out of the room in horror. He was later praised by Harry Truman, FDR’s successor and the seventh and final president Ford had interacted with, for his “great benefit to civilization” during the war.

As the incoming administration is shaped by and potentially hires outspoken corporate executives, those aboard both Air Force One and corporate jets would be wise to add “The Power and the Money” to their reading lists.

Henry Ford’s interactions with presidents over decades offers a reminder of how complex the dynamics of powerful personalities in the White House and C-suites can be. As the incoming administration is shaped by and potentially hires outspoken corporate executives, those aboard both Air Force One and corporate jets would be wise to add “The Power and the Money” to their reading lists.

Rabbi Dr. Stuart Halpern is Senior Adviser to the Provost of Yeshiva University and Deputy Director of Y.U.’s Straus Center for Torah and Western Thought. His books include “The Promise of Liberty: A Passover Haggada,” which examines the Exodus story’s impact on the United States, “Esther in America,” “Gleanings: Reflections on Ruth” and “Proclaim Liberty Throughout the Land: The Hebrew Bible in the United States.”