Generally, companies avoid being involved in politics and prefer to remain neutral, minding their own business. Of course, in a democracy, each citizen has the right to choose which political party they want to support but that’s personal and the company they work for would not influence them one way or another. At the same time, to keep things neutral within the company, actions associated with any political parties would be forbidden in the workplace and in policies.
That’s what someone in Goodyear probably wanted to remind people at a training event recently and it came to the attention of Donald Trump, the US President. He had learnt that a presentation slide at the event in one of the tyremaker’s factories was about company policy which does not permit political attire in the workplace, giving the red caps that carry the ‘Make America Great Again’ (MAGA) slogan of Trump’s Republican party as an example.
Under normal circumstances, the controversial President would probably just be angry but with his re-election campaign underway, he is even more furious about such ‘discrimination’. For Trump, not showing support for his policies and his administration are already bad enough, so forbidding people from wearing his party’s caps is deemed ‘unfair’. More so when the company is okay with issues relating to the ‘Black Lives Matter’ and LGBT movements, and allows its employees to wear apparel relating to these issues.
This led to him sending out a message to his supporters on Twitter to boycott Goodyear and not buy its tyres. “Don’t buy GOODYEAR TIRES – They announced a BAN ON MAGA HATS. Get better tires for far less! (This is what the Radical Left Democrats do. Two can play the same game, and we have to start playing it now!),” he urged.
Goodyear was quick to respond with a statement (via Twitter as well) that clarified that the training slide ‘was not created or distributed by Goodyear corporate’. The statement, however, reminded employees to ‘refrain from workplace expressions in support of political campaigning for any candidate or political party, as well as similar forms of advocacy that fall outside the scope of racial justice and equity issues’.
Goodyear is not the only company that has received such an attack by Trump. He has also called for a boycott of Harley-Davidson because it wanted to move its production out of America. Other companies and products that he has targeted include Apple, CNN, a scotch whisky company – and even Oreos (yes, those biscuits)! And with his war against China, Huawei and TikTok have also come under attack by Trump, who has been President since January 2017.
Whether Trump’s call to boycott Goodyear will have any noticeable effect on its tyre sales remains to be seen (he does have many supporters) but on his part, he might even ask for the tyres on ‘The Beast’ – the nickname for his huge limousine – to be made by someone else. The tyres were specially developed by Goodyear for the official car which is made by General Motors.
