According to the journalists on CBS This Morning, Monday, companies must target the NRA in the wake of the Parkland shooting. They also have to respond to the President’s Muslim ban, global warming and other issues that, coincidentally, call for liberal solutions. All of this is necessary to pacify millennials.
Axios co-founder Jim VandeHei explained how his left-leaning site shows why millennials must be appeased: “I see this even at Axios where the millennial work-force has a different expectation of us as employers. They expect you to take a stand. They expect you to have opinions. They expect you to stand for something bigger than just profit.”
Listing off several liberal issues, he added, “And you saw this with the Muslim ban, you saw it with immigration. You saw it with global warming, and now you're seeing it with guns.”
Axios co-founder Mike Allen chimed in and blamed the move against the NRA on... Donald Trump:
This includes LGBT discrimination. This includes immigration. Like all of those, it used to be risky for brand or company to talk it, now they have to. It's funny. This is partly a Trump effect. In the past year incentives have changed from pulling back to now you have to speak up.
VandeHei touted the potential millennial wave helping gun control activists:
If millennials turn out, if voters who are outraged turn out and suddenly you see members of Congress losing because of the gun issue, it won’t just change, it will change like that.
Of NRA fans, co-host John Dickerson described: “You have a calcified group supporting Second Amendment rights.”
Calcified gun supporters? Call the Smithsonian.
A partial transcript can be found below. Click “expand” for more:
CBS This Morning
2/26/18
8:05
JOHN DICKERSON: More than a dozen corporations including Delta airlines, Hertz and the First National Bank of Omaha say they are ending NRA member discounts and other perks in the wake of a school shooting. In a statement, the NRA calls that a “shameful display of political and civic cowardice.” Axios reports companies are increasingly stepping up on social issues when government has been reluctant or gridlocked. Mike Allen and Jim VandeHei are the co-founders of Axios and they are with us this morning. Good morning, gentlemen. Jim, let me ask you this question about the NRA. There are sometimes when corporations are ahead of politicians and that pulls the politicians along with them. There are sometimes when corporations react to pressure that’s different than the kind of pressure that operates on politicians. Which is it at play here with the NRA?
JIM VANDEHEI: I think there are two things that are hitting a company simultaneously that are really reshaping our relationship with the companies and the companies we work for. One is social media. People can instantly put pressure on companies to make big decisions about their products. Two, is and I see this even at Axios where the millennial work-force has a different expectation of us as employers. They expect you to take a stand. They expect you to have opinions. They expect you to stand for something bigger than just profit. And companies are feeling this. And you saw this with the Muslim ban, you saw it with immigration. You saw it with global warming, and now you're seeing it with guns where companies like Blackstone over the weekend, Bank of America over the weekend, are saying, listen, we're going to take a look at our clients' relationships with gun manufacturers. This never would have happened five or ten years ago. This never would have happened five or ten years ago.
GAYLE KING: No. When I was coming up, you didn't even challenge the company boss. You might have thought he or she was wrong but you wouldn't speak out about it, certainly so publicly.
MIKE ALLEN: Right. It's hard to be a CEO. Because these issues that Jim is talking about, and this includes Me Too. This includes LGBT discrimination. This includes immigration. Like all of those, it used to be risky for brand or company to talk it, now they have to. It's funny. This is partly a Trump effect. In the past year incentives have changed from pulling back to now you have to speak up.
DICKERSON: That's because purchasers make their decisions every day whether to fly Delta or not fly Delta. But voters are different in the way they behave. If you want to punish a lawmaker, you have to wait all the way until November and in this case you have a calcified group supporting Second Amendment rights. They believe in them very strongly and you have a push back. In terms of consumer products, you don't have the push back. So in terms of the way this effects on lawmakers, isn’t it going to be different?
VANDEHEI: You're right. for all the people who want change in the wake of this shootings, it has to be in voting. Listen, since the 1994 election, the reason a lot of Republicans and Democrats never challenged the NRA, they believed that it’s political suicide to do so. If millennials turn out, if voters who are outraged turn out and suddenly you see members of Congress losing because of the gun issue, it won’t just change, it will change like that. Because lawmakers respond to incentives and the incentive and the incentive is for them is “I want to keep my job.” If you lose your job because of it, the game changes on a debate that was otherwise confirmed for 30 years.
ALLEN: I was talking to a lawmaker this weekend. Your freedom rider is going to be a vote never 2020 and they're starting to realize there's a big wave coming up and just as their consumer behavior is different, they also are a lot more likely to have their own opinions and mirror their folks or mirror some of the other influencers that millennials have in the past.
