Maurice Taylor Jr. (born August 28, 1944) is the President and
Chief executive officer
A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a central executive officer (CEO), chief administrator officer (CAO) or just chief executive (CE), is one of a number of corporate executives charged with the management of an organization especially ...
of
Titan International, a tire and wheel manufacturing company. Taylor, nicknamed "the Grizz" for his bear-like gruffness, started in
tool and die
Tool and die makers are highly skilled crafters working in the manufacturing industries. Variations on the name include tool maker, toolmaker, die maker, diemaker, mold maker, moldmaker or tool jig and die-maker depending on which area of concen ...
manufacturing before purchasing Titan Wheel International from
Firestone.
Taylor was born in Detroit, Michigan, and raised in
Ellsworth, Michigan
Ellsworth is a village in Antrim County in the U.S. state of Michigan. The population was 349 at the 2010 census. The village is located within Banks Township.
The village is primarily a bedroom community with its primary industry being grave ...
. He gained brief fame outside the business world when he made an unsuccessful run for the
Republican
Republican can refer to:
Political ideology
* An advocate of a republic, a type of government that is not a monarchy or dictatorship, and is usually associated with the rule of law.
** Republicanism, the ideology in support of republics or agains ...
nomination in the
U.S. presidential election of 1996, a campaign chronicled in his book ''Kill all the lawyers – and other ways to fix the government''. He spent over $6 million, but received about 1% of the vote in all the primaries in which he ran. His campaign is featured prominently in the
Michael Lewis
Michael Monroe Lewis (born October 15, 1960) Gale Biography In Context. is an American author and financial journalist. He has also been a contributing editor to ''Vanity Fair'' since 2009, writing mostly on business, finance, and economics. He ...
book ''
Trail Fever''. Taylor was also one of the subjects on the 19th episode of
PRI's ''
This American Life
''This American Life'' (''TAL'') is an American monthly hour-long radio program produced in collaboration with Chicago Public Media and hosted by Ira Glass. It is broadcast on numerous public radio stations in the United States and internation ...
'' entitled "Rich Guys", originally aired in 1996.
In February 2013, Taylor met harsh criticism in France after a letter he wrote to the French minister of industrial renewal,
Arnaud Montebourg
Arnaud Montebourg (; born 30 October 1962) is a French politician, lawyer and entrepreneur who served as the Minister of Industrial Renewal from 2012 to 2014,[Michelin
Michelin (; ; full name: ) is a French multinational tyre manufacturing company based in Clermont-Ferrand in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes ''région'' of France. It is the second largest tyre manufacturer in the world behind Bridgestone and la ...]
is vastly larger and more profitable than Titan. In February 2015, in an interview with the French TV about the closed Goodyear factory, Taylor said that "France is a ruined country".
References
*
External links
*
Presidential Campaign video clips
1944 births
Living people
Candidates in the 1996 United States presidential election
20th-century American politicians
20th-century American businesspeople
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