As CEOs Distance Themselves from Trump, Their Businesses Continue to Profit from White Supremacy
In the wake of the white supremacist terrorist attack in Charlottesville and President Trump’s failure to condemn the violence committed in his name, a handful of business leaders walked away from their largely symbolic seats on Trump’s American Manufacturing Advisory Council. To stop the high-profile public hemorrhage of corporate support, Trump declared “you’re fired!” to the remaining members of the Council and the Strategy and Policy Forum.

Trump’s misogyny, islamophobia, xenophobia, and attacks on LGBTQ Americans have apparently not been offensive enough for this set of corporate executives. The CEOs act shocked at Trump’s sympathy for Nazis. Yet the president’s intolerable statements in response to Charlottesville mark the latest racist chapter in his political life — one teeming with hate speech and dangerous stances rooted in white supremacy, bigotry, and discrimination.
We should not applaud or hand out medals to CEOs who finally bowed out of these councils. Public pressure and concern for their bottom line and reputations drove their decisions to leave these ceremonial posts, nothing more. As we saw during the wave of protests surrounding Trump’s Muslim Ban, corporations are simply following the crowd.
These corporate titans are by no means friends of people of color and others who have been targets of Trump and his white supremacist allies. Once out of the public eye, we can expect business as usual. CEOs who will not unite the country or serve the interests of anyone but wealthy shareholders.
Corporate America has a long history of perpetuating white supremacy through their hazardous workplaces, destructive patterns of development, and exploitative financial products that harm communities of color. Big businesses take advantage of our country’s legacy of racism to fund anti-union legislation like “right to work” and often locate their facilities in southern states where the shadow of Jim Crow ensures legal protections for working people are minimal. And corporate-funded organizations like the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) play a key role in propagating racist laws such as “stand your ground” and voter ID requirements.
One of the most infamous corporations on Trump’s advisory boards was Walmart, represented by CEO Doug McMillon. While McMillion only left the council because it was dissolved, he criticized the President’s non-condemnation, saying that Walmart’s sole intent was to “build a more diverse and inclusive society.” Walmart’s record tells a completely different story. The retail giant pays the folks who work for them, mainly women and people of color, wages they can’t sustain a family on and retaliates against those who dare try and improve their jobs. Upon entering African-American neighborhoods like Washington, DC’s Brightwood, Walmart squeezes small businesses and fails to provide the high-quality jobs it promises.
Then there’s Steve Schwarzman, CEO of the private equity giant Blackstone group, and, until this week, chair of Trump’s Strategy and Policy Forum. Aside from being one of the president’s biggest corporate cheerleaders, Schwarzman and Blackstone routinely take advantage of low-income Americans and communities of color. Blackstone-owned Exeter Finance is one of the top providers of subprime auto loans, including the exploitative leases pushed by Uber to encourage new drivers to work for them. Blackstone also recently became the largest owner of single-family rental housing. Taking advantage of the foreclosure crisis caused directly by Wall Street, Schwarzman’s firm bought up thousands of homes in predominantly African-American communities at rock-bottom prices during the recession. Blackstone rents the properties at sky-high rates back to the families ravaged by foreclosure, often neglecting routine maintenance and repairs.
It is hard to think of a lower moral bar than rejecting Nazism. We cannot let corporations that cozied up to the Trump administration be praised for choosing this moment to be outraged. Instead, we must expand the scope of our protest, challenging these companies to stop hurting communities across the country and the world.
To all these executives, we are watching. You may have turned your backs to Trump this week, but you will not fool us. We know that you will continue to seek influence in the White House and Congress to boost your bottom lines and ignore the needs of working Americans. Nearly every CEO who took a position on Trump’s advisory teams had something to gain from the administration at the expense of the rest of us — be it tax cuts, trade deals, or rollbacks of regulations that improve the lives and living conditions of Americans. Whether you chose to leave these advisory bodies voluntarily or not, we will hold you accountable for your actions and the policies that you support.
