NEW YORK—U.S. President Donald Trump’s main council of top corporate leaders disbanded on Wednesday following the president’s controversial remarks in which he equated white nationalist hate groups with the protesters opposing them. Soon after, the president announced on Twitter that he would end his executive councils, “rather than put pressure” on executives.The quick sequence began late Wednesday morning when Stephen A. Schwarzman, the chief executive of the Blackstone Group and one of Trump’s closest confidants in the business community, organized a conference call for members of the president’s Strategic and Policy Forum.On the call, the chief executives of some of the largest companies in the country debated how to proceed.After a discussion among a dozen prominent CEOs, the decision was made to abandon the group altogether, said people with knowledge of details of the call.The council included Laurence Fink of BlackRock, Ginni Rometty of IBM, Rich Lesser of the Boston Consulting Group and Toby Cosgrove of the Cleveland Clinic, among others.Before the president’s decision to dissolve the two councils, executive from his manufacturing council were expected to have a similar call Wednesday afternoon. The manufacturing panel has seen a wave of defections since Monday, as business chiefs who had agreed to advise the president determined that his remarks left them with no choice but to walk away.Two additional chief executives — Denise Morrison of Campbell Soup and Inge Thulin of 3M — had announced Wednesday morning they would resign from the manufacturing council.The defections left Trump all but isolated from the business leaders whose approval he covets.Read more:Donald Trump defends far-right extremists in astonishing tirade, again blames both sides for Charlottesville violenceShame the Charlottesville white supremacists on social media: TeitelTrump’s presidency a long descent into ...
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