Small business group to launch bus tour opposing Biden agenda

A small business advocacy group is launching a grassroots bus tour next week to highlight concerns over aspects of the Biden administration’s agenda in a preview of the fight to come for the 2022 midterm elections.

The Job Creators Network, a conservative group created by Home Depot founder Bernie Marcus, is re-launching its Bring Small Businesses Back Bus Tour as part of a seven-figure campaign to oppose policies of the Biden administration, according to an announcement obtained first by The Hill.

The bus tour will begin next Wednesday in Dallas, where the organization will highlight the work of Rep. Beth Van Duyne (R-Texas), a freshman representative who narrowly won her election last November. Van Duyne could be a vulnerable incumbent in 2022 as President Biden carried her district by roughly 5 percentage points.

Job Creators Network will also hold an event next Friday in Missouri with Rep. Blaine Luetkemeyer (R-Mo.), who has served in the House since 2009 and was among the dozens of Republicans in January who opposed certifying the presidential election results of certain states.

The bus tour will make future stops in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Indiana, Florida and Georgia, hosting appearances with members of Congress in each instance.

“America’s small business community is under assault. The pandemic has taken a dramatic toll, and the proposed policies of the Biden Administration are squarely aimed at small business,” Job Creators Network President Alfredo Ortiz said in a statement. “Now more than ever, we need America’s 90-million-strong small business community to lead our recovery.”

Ortiz raised concerns about Democratic policies that have encouraged more spending despite worries about inflation, as well as jobless benefits that some critics have argued contribute to lingering unemployment amid the pandemic recovery. Job Creators Network has more broadly raised concerns about Democratic efforts to increase the minimum wage, which they argue would unfairly burden small businesses.

The organization’s grassroots tour will kick off as Congress returns from recess and will turn its attention to a $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill that already passed the Senate, as well as a Democratic push for a multitrillion-dollar reconciliation package to fund priorities for education, climate policy and health care, among other areas.