Things in the campaign that haunted him and no one gave him the benefit of the doubt and then he continued to drive he does not deserve the benefit the of the doubt all right folks, thank you very much. Jared, sarah, we appreciate it as we get to the top of the hour on power lunch, lets bring in kelly evans and Bill Griffith to join us as they will carry forward. Were giving you a big handoff here, folks. It has been a wild two hours with lots of news. I know youll be following it exhaustively somehow, i think its not over yet, tyler, yes were going to pick up the ball from here. Thank you, folks well see you a little bit later. If youre just joining us and you havent heard yet somehow, Business Leaders bailing on trump. Two key Business Advisory councils have been disbanded after more ceos quit in the aftermath of the criticism over mr. Trumps respond to the deadly violence in charlottesville this weekend the president himself gave a fiery response to the ceo departures yesterday lets all remember what he said. Some of the folks that will leave, theyre leaving out of embarrassment because they make their products outside and ive been lecturing them, including the gentleman that youre referring to, you have to bring it back to this country. Yes that was yesterday in what became an impromptu press conference that now has embroiled him even more deeply and caused several ceos to leave, Manufacturing Councils, get together and decide they want to pull out entirely of the strategic and policy forum andrew and iowa man are standing by with more on the fallout. Andrew, lets again with you lets bring you up to date. The president has said he is disbanding these groups, but let there be no doubt, both of these groups deciding to disband, unmask themselves. Resignation of dozens at this point deciding that it wasnt because of embarrassment about their own roles, but in part, outrage and furry over President Trumps comments over the past several days just to put a quick timeline on this, a lot took place this morning, but in fact, it started in truth, some time late sunday and early monday as a number of ceos began a series of informal telephone calls among themselves about how to react, what to do, and perhaps whether they should unite to resign. There was some pushback early on monday to wait to hear what the president might say. Of course he did come out with his statement, potentially even the possibility that the councils koul put out their own statements condemning what took place over the weekend, but this all reached a boiling point tuesday afternoon, after President Trump doubled down on his statements and by tuesday evening, the dye had been cast, calls were set up. They originally planned to have the calls on tuesday evening for to begin this process. And they did ultimately take place on wednesday throughout much of this we should say Steve Schwarzman had been in contact with the white house updating them on where many on the council sat on these particular issues. And we should say that a lot of was driven early on my a number of female Ceos Mary Barra at gm and jenny had a number of informal telephone calls our soils tell us along with larry and jamie who was in a particularly complicated role given that not only does he run jpmorgan, hes now the chairman of the round table on behalf of 200 ceos i want to read two quick statements from two of the members that were on that committee. Mary bara who did have early conversations about whether to resign writing to her employees, General Motors is about unity and inclusion, so am i, recent events require that we come together as a country and reinforce values in our deals that unite us. Tolerance, inclusion, diversity, and speak against those who divide us, racism, bigotry larry fink also sending a memo to his employees this morning. He writes in part, while i have disagreed with the president in certain instances this year, i continued to participate in the forum because i believed it was important to have a voice at the table for investors, including our clients. Unfortunately after the last few days, i concluded i could no longer in good conscious participate in the forum it wasnt just the comments that the president made over the weekend and doubling down on it tuesday afternoon, which clearly outraged many of these executives it was also the way the president treated both kim fraser in reaction to his decision to get off of the Manufacturing Council and then later a comment that was made about doug mcmillens walmart after he sent a statement out to his employees condemning both the violence and the president s reaction on monday evening thats all from here before we let you go, andrew, and before aman. Im going to sound cynical, but i was intrigued that within the statement that the council put out to announce the disbanding, they also pointed out it wasnt just them voting their conscious, but they went out of their way to point out theyve been hearing from employees and customers on this issue. And you wonder how much that really played into this as well. My understanding is pretty much across the board, a lot of these ceos were hearing from their employees both formerly, informally, emails, phone calls, comments literally at the office and of course, customers were sending in notes as well it should be noted, this cuts both ways. You go on social media right now, and there are people applauding these ceos, calling his decisions brave and there are others on the other side of this situation who may boycott and protest some of these companies. So, thats its complicated and what about the president s inner circle andrew, thank you. For more on it, the decision to disband the forums puts more stress on the cabinet. Yeah, thats right, the president has left trump tower and the white sanitation trucks just pulled out of here moments ago. The president on his way to bedminister, new jersey, where hell continue this working vacation hes been on for the past several days. Although there hasnt been much vacationing in that working vacation recently. You heard andrew talking about the president characterizing as this himself disbanding these councils heres what the president tweeted a little while ago rather than putting pressure on the Business People of the Manufacturing Council and strategic and policy forum, i am ending both. Thank you all. The president there saying that this was his initiative, not the Ceos Initiative to end these councils well see what the ceos have to say about that as you heard from andrew just a few minutes ago. Meanwhile, just enormous amounts of speculation about whether or not that was the last shoe to drop today or not. We so far have not seen any indication that there is any movement inside the president s team here at trump tower or down at the white house in washington, d. C. Not clear exactly whos traveling with him were trying to figure that out right no to bedminister, new jersey a lot of speculation focussed on those people on his team who were standing next to him during that Fiery Press Conference yesterday. Gary kohn, steven mnuchin, elaine chow was standing there as well. All of them have been very quiet. Theres been reporting in Media Outlets that some, all, or various members were disappointed, frustrated, angry with the president s comments. So far publicly, no indication that theres any movement at all on the trump staff so well continue to monitor that as the afternoon goes on, guys, back over to you all right eamon, thank you lets bring in former walmart usa bill simon, mr. Simon, we spoke on monday when this was all first happening, and you had said like some others who chose to stay on the councils that if good people will not engage on these critical issues, where will we be i ask you given his press conference yesterday, would you have joined those who then left the councils and said that they couldnt continue working with this white house well, i wont criticize any of those who based on their conscious decided to walk away the fact that the president makes insensitive remarks and does it on a frequent basis without thinking is not new news hes done that all through the campaign and they knew that when they joined the council. The question that i would have to ask myself and the one that im sure they wrestled with it where do we go from here we still need tax reform we still need Health Care Reform we still need to run this country. And now, they dont have aseat at the table and now the president doesnt have the best assets that he has to move forward. I can in no way defend what the president has said or done, but we have to figure out a way to move forward and i think thats whats most concerning today you sound like youre willing to forgive what he said so that you can get back to the business of tax reform and, you know, the rest of the president s agenda, am i reading that wrong or right . Youre reading it wrong theres no way to forgive what he said. I think the question that you have to ask yourself is, how do we move forward . What he said can never be condoned and never been forgiven, never be understood by most americans, but hes still the president of the United States and if were if were sort of resigning ourself to the fact that were going to have three and a half more years of inactivity on these major issues, were dwloon we can stand that we have to figure out a way to go forward. I wouldnt go to dinner with him, but i would probably figure out a way to work with him if you can work with him. Let me bring up with jamie diamond said, nobody was more bow i have is reduce on the Economic Issues that face this country right now, not the least of which is Corporate Tax reform, even jamie diamond came out very strongly and said, i just cant work under these circumstances after those statements were made and he felt very strongly about that so, you know, im not trying to put you into a corner here, but you seem to be differing on the response to what the president said and looking past it to be able to get back to the issue that faces the economy right now. I dont know that anybody, any americans will ever be able to get passed the comments i think the question is what do we do from here . So are we going to choose to bring everything to a grinding halt because we have a president by the way that we elected knowing the way he was or are we going to figure out a way to move forward im not going to say support him. Be signed by him, done by the administration. And if were saying as jamie did, and i respect him hes a brilliant person. That were no longer able to engage, were saying nothings going to happen. And i just dont know that we can take three and a half more years of nothing happening i think maybe the braver, the bigger way would be as distasteful as it might be, try to figure out a way to move forward. I wonder if the ceos got a call from the president and said i want to ask you, you know, what you think about this. Im sure they would take the call, right . Do you think that in a way this is a symbolic move meant to send a message to the president and to the public or do you think they will actuallying with trump i dont know the answer to that im sure they would still take a phone call, my question would be would the president call them now . He doesnt seem to be that sort of a forgiving person. He does tend to remember slights. If thats the case, who do you think he is going to be talking to i dont know. Thats my worry. If good people dont engage, were left with people who arent as good as the ones originally selected. And thats the challenge if anythings going to be done, its going to be done by not by the best people that we have and thats troublesome all right bill, thank you for joining us thanks. My pleasure bill simon is the former ceo of walmart usa lets talk about the markets right now. Within the context of whats been happening in washington and new york city today, the dow up 28 points was higher than that, weve seen the equity markets come back a little bit nothing major. Two other markets of note today, gold prices have gone higher, clearly, not by a whole lot, but enough that its you notice it, and the dollar has moved lower both as the dollar index and against some of the major currencies overseas. So, were seeing that kind of a market response today. Lets talk about it with our guests right now Kevin Nickelson from river front Investment Group is with us here at post nine, so is kenny from laneil securities and Rick Santelli checks in from chicago. Kevin, ive got to ask the obvious question, how this affects you as a professional and as an African American man with whats been going on the last few days here i mean, you know, its just devastating all the way around i think that when you look at this, you see that and you know that the trump agenda has been totally derailed at this point we have been looking for infrastructure building as part of the third tenant of his agenda that was probably going to come in 2018. I dont see that happening now when you have lost the Business Communitys credibility, then you have an issue because when you think about the infrastructure building, it was public and private partnership and if the Business Community has now stepped away, its going to be kind of hard to find that private partnership. And this was all taking place at an event that was supposed to tout his infrastructure initiatives. Not much of that was discussed, and today was supposed to be the launch of naft negotiations and youre not hearing anything about that we have a brady out there trying to talk about tax reform and it doesnt feel like his message is going to be heard when everybodys consumed by how theyre even supposed to interact with that white house i dont think the message will be consumed until we get through this i think the whole issue today is consuming markets, consuming kind of the conversation as bill simon pointed out, really where you go from here, not that anybody, myself included is condoning anything that happened, but if youre trying to engage a Business Community, in order to advance the policies or to come up with policies and initiatives, where do you go from here . And he points out, the people that left, trumps certainly not going to call up and say i was kidding, come on back, or hes going to reach out to now whos next and who is is going to be advising and then, therefore, for the market rick, i mean, im sure youve got comments to make here. Im curious your thoughts on the market response in particular, again, it wasnt a huge response, but clearly gold was going up, that safe haven plate that we saw go higher during the crisis last week involving north korea and the dollar just continues to set lows again here yeah, i think on the dollar maybe the headlines of the day or the last couple of days might have taken a toll. Hard to say, youre right. For the most part, its been weak we did experience a bit of a turn around, especially in the euro which give a bit of a more positive look to the dollar thats dissipated today. You know, when i look at equities, were getting a different message. And granted theyre not on the highs of the day, but never spent a significant amount of time in negative territory and my read is that everything everybodys saying of course, these are big issues that repeal and replace didnt pass because ceos didnt vote for it its because the senate didnt vote for it. And that really hasnt changed with respect to tax policy i understand the dynamics and the show of force having all the Business People at a table its good oped. Its good photo ops is what it is but im not so sure that tax policy cant move if we dont have these committees, if theyve disbanded because really the only committee on tax policy that matters right now is congress and kevin, i mean, to that point, there have been plenty of separate deregulatory initiatives moving along in the background here. How big of a loss is it and do you think that maybe Congress Says okay well if we cant run, you know, on the coat tails of this president in the midterms, then we better have Something Else that we can show our constituents yeah, i think that congress is going to have to come up with their own plan, and theyre going to have to start stepping across the aisle and working, you know, with the democrats and republicans. Theyre going to have to Work Together because otherwise, were going to be at a standstill do you expect though that democrats would take this opportunity to come together with them in a bipartisan way or are they going to in some ways take the moral high ground and say, you know, we are not engaging and kind of keep this on the entire Republican Party and say, hes your president you know, i would hope that they dont do that just because you would like to see, you know, the unify the country because we have been, you know, broken apart enough and weve had enough pain over the last week or so and, you know, i think its time for us to unite amen. Good to see you all. Thank you. Appreciate it, Kevin Nickelson, kenny, rick, thanks for joining us appreciate it. Weve got 40 minutes left on the trading session. The dow up 27. You see it there, the s p, the nasdaq trying to hang on to some gains here the russell is in negative territory. The president disbanding his Manufacturing Council and the strategic and policy forum after the ceos were quitting anyway. When we come back, head live to washington find out how Top Republican leaders are reacting to the latest news and President Trumps controversial comments over the racial violence in charlottesville. Plus ken fraser for being the first to resign from the Manufacturing Council. Coming up, the ceo of another drug maker joins us to denefd frasers action. Well be right back. For y