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Trump said Sunday he would consider raising the federal minimum wage.
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Some Republicans have floated the idea, including Vice President-elect J.D. Vance.
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It will likely face significant opposition in Congress – from members of the Republican Party.
Over the weekend, President-elect Donald Trump said he would consider raising the federal minimum wage, saying the current rate of $7.25 an hour is a “very low number.”
“There’s a level at which you could absolutely do it,” Trump said in an interview with NBC on Sunday, declining to commit to a specific dollar amount. ‘I would consider it. I would like to speak to the governors.’
As the Republican Party has attempted to transform itself into a labor party, several Republicans have proposed increases in the federal minimum wage. Vice President J.D. Vance co-sponsored a bill in 2023 that would increase this to $11 an hour, while Senator Josh Hawley of Missouri has proposed mandating a $15 minimum wage for companies with more than $1 billion in annual revenue generate.
While Vance and Hawley have led the way for a more economically populist Republican agenda, their position remains unpopular within a party filled with free-market enthusiasts who broadly support business interests.
“If we’re going to look at it, we need to repeal it,” Rep. Eric Burlison, a Missouri Republican who serves on the House Education and Workforce Committee, told BI about the federal minimum wage. “I don’t think it should exist.”
Despite Trump’s comments, it is not clear that the president-elect considers the minimum wage a priority at all. He did not seek an increase during his first term, threatened to veto a 2019 Democratic bill that would raise the price to $15, and dodged a question on the subject during his photo op at McDonald’s in October.
He has long taken a more open position on the issue than many Republicans. He supported a $10 minimum wage during his 2016 campaign and said he would consider a $15 minimum wage during a 2020 presidential debate. That gives more populist-minded Republicans hope that if Trump chooses to spend political capital on the issue, he can push the party to embrace a higher minimum wage.
After all, he has managed to break longstanding Republican orthodoxy on trade and foreign policy.
“These people wouldn’t be doing two-thirds of what we’re going to do over the next two years if it weren’t for Trump,” Hawley said. “Let’s be honest.”
The Trump-Vance transition did not respond to a request for comment.
Not a ‘area of focus” for the Republican Party
Any increase in the minimum wage would require an act of Congress, and Republicans in both the House of Representatives and the Senate told BI on Tuesday they opposed it. In general, they repeated long-standing party dogma on the issue, arguing that wages are best determined by market forces and that any increase would simply lead to rising prices.
“I don’t think the federal government should get involved in these issues,” said Republican Rep. Chip Roy of Texas. “Let the markets figure out how we can do this.”
Republicans are not unanimously opposed to an increase in the minimum wage. The proposal that Vance supported – the Higher Wages for American Workers Act – is also supported by Republican senators such as Tom Cotton of Arkansas, Susan Collins of Maine, Mitt Romney of Utah and Bill Cassidy of Louisiana. Aside from raising the minimum wage to $11 over several years, the bill would also require companies to verify that their employees are authorized to work in the United States — a priority for many Republicans.
Senator Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia – a member of the Republican Senate leadership who also supports the bill – told BI on Tuesday that she does not expect any movement on that bill in the next Congress, and that she hoped for “increasing economic growth.” The consequences of Trump’s policies would organically cause wages to rise.
“I just don’t see that this is going to be a focus area that we’re going to go into,” Capito said.
A federal minimum wage increase would be popular. Polls have consistently shown that a significant share of Republicans support the idea, and several Republican states have approved minimum wage increases through ballot measures in recent years.
At the same time, few people still earn $7.25 per hour. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, only 1.1% of hourly workers were at or below the federal minimum wage in 2023. Most states have implemented higher minimum wages, and some cities have gone even higher.
“The question is: is that necessary?” Republican Representative Glenn Thompson of Pennsylvania said. “Honestly, if you look across the country, positions that used to be minimum wage are now paying $15, $16, $17 an hour.”
President Joe Biden supports a $15 federal minimum wage but was unable to implement it in 2021 due to opposition from several Democratic senators.
Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, meanwhile, has proposed an increase to $17.
Read the original article on Business Insider
