Having previously lost Merck CEO Kenneth Frazier from the president’s manufacturing council, followed by Under Armour’s Kevin Plank and Intel Corp.’s Brian Krzanich, who both also said on Monday that they were also stepping down, and followed by the president of the Alliance for American Manufacturing, Scott Paul, who said on Tuesday that he was quitting the group as it was “the right thing for me to do" moments ago the president of the AFL-CIO also resigned from the Presidential Council on Manufacturing, claiming that Trump "tolerates bigotry and domestic terrorism" and stating that "President Trump's remarks today repudiate his forced remarks yesterday about the KKK and neo-Nazis. We must resign on behalf of America's working people, who reject all notions of legitimacy of these bigoted groups."
I cannot sit on a council for a President that tolerates bigotry and domestic terrorism; I resign, effective immediately. pic.twitter.com/ip6F2nsoog
— Richard L. Trumka (@RichardTrumka) August 15, 2017
The full statement by Trumka is below:
Statement by AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka on his and Thea Lee's resignation from President Trump, council on manufacturing:
We cannot sit on a council for a president who tolerates bigotry and domestic terrorism. President Trump's remarks today repudiate his forced remarks yesterday about the KKK and neo-Nazis. We must resign on behalf of America's working people, who reject all notions of legitimacy of these bigoted groups.
It's clear that President Trump's Manufacturing Council was never an effective means for delivering real policy that lifts working families and his remarks today were the last straw. We joined this council with the intent to be a voice for working people and real hope that it would result in positive economic policy, but it has become yet another broken promise on the President's record. From hollow councils to bad policy and embracing bigotry, the actions of this administration have consistently failed working people.
On Tuesday afternoon, Trump said the CEOs quitting his advisory council aren’t taking their jobs seriously, and said some are producing offshore: "They’re not taking their job seriously as it pertains to this country,” the president said of the executives at a press conference at Trump Tower in New York Tuesday afternoon. “If you look at some of those people that you’re talking about, they’re outside of the country, they’re having a lot of their product made outside, if you look at Merck as an example."
Earlier on Tuesday morning on Twitter Trump said "For every CEO that drops out of the Manufacturing Council, I have many to take their place. Grandstanders should not have gone on. JOBS!”
James Post, professor of management emeritus for the Questrom School of Business at Boston University told Bloomberg that “the value of the advisory council goes down when respected members leave over issues of principle. Whereas the president could have claimed to learn from the council, now it seems that he only listens when they agree with his opinion."
At the this rate, there will be no council left in just a few more hours.