On Sunday night, Vice President Mike Pence defended Trump’s response and by Monday morning Attorney General Jeff Sessions had also chimed in.
‘He made a very strong statement that directly contradicted the ideology of hatred, violence, bigotry, racism, white supremacy,’ Session, during an appearance on the Today show, argued.
But that wasn’t enough to sway Frazier, whose statement from the official Merck Twitter account quickly picked up steam.
‘I am resigning from the President’s American Manufacturing Council,’ he wrote.
‘Our country’s strength stems from its diversity and the contributions by men and women of different faiths, races, sexual orientations and political beliefs,’ Frazier said.
Frazier’s exit marks the fourth time a prominent CEO has walked away from one of Trump’s White House boards.
On the heels of Trump exiting the Paris climate accord, Tesla CEO Elon Musk, also part of the American Manufacturing Council, threw in the towel. Disney CEO Bob Iger, who served on the president’s Strategic and Policy Forum exited over Paris too.
Now former Uber CEO Travis Kalanick left Trump’s boards in February over the administration’s travel ban, which targeted Muslim-majority countries.
Another member of the manufacturing board, Under Armour’s Kevin Plank, also tweeted about Charlottesville on Monday, but didn’t say if he, too, would leave the group.
‘We are saddened by #Charlottesville. There is no place for racism or discrimination in this world. We choose love & unity,’ Plank wrote.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4789118/Merck-CEO-quits-Trump-board-Charlottesville-response.html