The Curious Case of MAGA Finance Bros

Narratives are outrunning the data.

We all know the type. They wear Patagonia vests, Peter Millar quarter-zips, and Lululemon stretch chinos. They love golf and hate cancel culture. They’re proud of the company they work at and prouder of the money they make working there. Earlier iterations have been mythologized in films like American Psycho and The Big Short. The Finance Bro.

Long an object of our cultural fascination—often derision, occasionally admiration—the bros and their bosses stepped into the political spotlight this past election cycle. Wall Street billionaires, from Bill Ackman to Stephen Schwarzman, flooded towards Donald Trump. “Wall Street goes MAGA,” declared the Financial Times last summer. Harris and Trump chased podcasters across the country in an effort to court the bro vote (a media battle won by Trump). The fervor only seemed to intensify after Democrats’ November drubbing. It was a “vibe shift” felt in corporate office buildings across the country.

“I feel liberated,” a banker told the Financial Times after the election. “We can say ‘retard’ and ‘pussy’ without the fear of getting cancelled .” Another added, “Most of us don’t have to kiss ass because, like Trump, we love America and capitalism.” Corporate America, it seemed, was on board the Trump train.

Recently, though, it’s been the left’s turn to gloat. As the markets plummeted on and after “Liberation Day,” liberals took to social media to thumb their nose at the so-called MAGA finance bros. The memes and posts were, essentially, we told you so and you’re getting what you deserve. (Trying to actually win back these voters seemed lower on the priority list.) Five months after the election, both parties remain obsessed with the finance bro and his politics.

But what hard evidence do we really have that finance bros are actually embracing Trump and the GOP? Young men as a whole have definitely moved right. Corporate policy shifts have also been obvious; many DEI and climate change programs were quickly abandoned in the wake of Trump’s win. Some of the biggest names in the tech and business world donated millions to the inauguration and many attended themselves. Are they representative of the average finance bro? What about the traders, advisors, and analysts who actually stock the ranks of corporate America?

The data is murkier than post-election narratives would lead one to believe. First, there is the obvious challenge of actually isolating their vote. There is no finance bro crosstab in the exit polls. Most evidence for the MAGA-fication of the corporate world is anecdotal—obnoxious quotes from anonymous bankers or endorsements from high-profile executives and billionaires. We can, however, approximate the shifts by looking at a combination of demographic, geographic, and donation data.

Luckily, finance bros tend to move in packs. Across America’s biggest cities, a few neighborhoods attract a disproportionate number of the young, wealthy, college-educated, and mostly white men with whom we’re concerned. Did these places race towards Trump in 2024? In New York, I was directed towards the lower Manhattan neighborhoods of Murray Hill, Kips Bay, and the West Village. As with much of the Big Apple, the 2020-2024 shift is clearly towards Trump, even as most precincts remain heavily Democratic.

Interestingly, however, the magnitude of the pro-Trump shift appears less severe in the precincts flush with finance bros. Most precincts in Murray Hill and Kips Bay moved 5-10 points towards Trump, while those in the West Village were closer to 10-15 points. This is, of course, very real movement towards the GOP, but far less notable than the massive shifts we saw in many working-class, minority neighborhoods. Just a couple dozen blocks south in Chinatown, for example, many precincts moved upwards of 30 points towards Trump.

The story looks similar in San Francisco and, to spot check a swing state, Atlanta. Neighborhoods like Cow Hollow and the Marina in San Francisco shifted 5-10 points to the right, while Asian and Hispanic areas in the East Bay moved towards Trump much more dramatically. Many precincts in Buckhead, an upscale neighborhood in north Atlanta, actually shifted left even as Trump flipped Georgia. Even if this leftward drift owed more to population change than persuasion, these results hardly suggest a dramatic realignment in corporate America.

A more muted migration makes sense demographically. Rich, college-educated, white Americans were one of the groups most likely to stick with Harris and the Democrats. In 2020, Joe Biden carried white, urban, college-educated men by five points (52 percent to 47 percent). Four years later, Kamala Harris carried this same group by a whopping thirty points (64 percent to 34 percent). For comparison, white, urban, college-educated women actually moved 9 points towards Trump!

Perhaps, however, the votes of Trump-loving bankers were drowned out by their liberal neighbors. Precinct-level analysis is helpful, but even the aforementioned neighborhoods are not 100 percent finance bros. Enter the FEC’s handy contribution records.

I pulled all political contributions from Goldman Sachs, J.P. Morgan, BlackRock, and Morgan Stanley employees in New York between Labor Day and Election Day 2024. There were more than 1,700 donations in the two month period, overwhelmingly towards liberal candidates and causes. ActBlue, the primary Democratic fundraising platform, saw 417 donations compared to just 30 towards WinRed, the Republican equivalent. “Harris for President” and “Harris Victory Fund” received 213 donations. Trump’s primary PACs received only a few dozen donations.

Even if we filter for those who list their occupation as “financial” or “banking” to exclude non-finance positions, the donations remain overwhelmingly blue. If money is any indication, our archetypal finance bro actually seems pretty liberal—which isn’t all that surprising considering their demographic profile. It was working-class, non-white voters who drove the big pro-Trump swings in cities across the country.

Corporate America and its legions of finance bros did shift towards Trump. But endorsements and donations from high-profile CEOs are not necessarily representative of the rank-and-file. As the fallout from Trump’s tariffs continues, we should avoid putting the cart before the horse when analyzing Wall Street’s politics.