as far as my generation, there is no way we are having any of this >> let me correct something i misstated earlier in our conversation with richard fisher, the at&t ceo, randall stevenson, served on one of these committees in fact, he does not most of you may know he was in the room at least on one occasion with the president and other business leaders this is brian sullivan joining us as power lunch is underway as well this is a significant moment given the number of ceos leaving on this one council and the big names we are talking about >> we are. campbell's soup, 3m. the rolling stone may gather no moss this has gathered no momentum.

the question i ask for michelle and tyler whach what happens if and when the manufacturing council decides to dissolve the strategic and advisory council has now officially tried to disband do you try to create a new one or go on the ceos he tried to put himself so close to. >> president trump is going to be extremely angry he is going to take this very personally >> he tweeted yesterday or the day before, when people started to leave, that he had others lined up to come in and take their place. we will see, i guess, if these kind of councils are very, very valuable to the white house and the president.

he will try and reconstitute it. it will be interesting to see who will accept a position on it that council why do you think we are not seeing more of a market reaction to any of this not just today but yesterday, to everything that has gone on. this is a stock market that ignores every single thing that comes out of washington. it is completely divorced from donald trump >> because multinationals are the new sovereign. we have trillion dollar companies that can raise hundreds of millions of dollars at will. they have boards of directors and ceos that can function without somebody in washington telling them what they can do every five minutes investors have more confidence in tim cook and jeff bezos than they have in anyone in the

senate >> has the president become a work-around? >> 100%. >> he has become a nonevent. his approval ratings are the lowest in history. >> the comedy show of anybody else tl there is nothing in the market for a trump rally. that's long gone the markets assume that he will get nothing done he is a nuisance he is an embarrasment. >> one of our producers has a quote, everybody on the call spoke individually they allowed them to discount and disband. yesterday was the point of no return the ceos said they were hearing from employees, customers, the public it suggested a complete lack of control. >> how could they not? look at jpmorgan think about how many stakeholders are involved with

jpmorgan, everyone from people with checking accounts to employees, to board members. you much customers all over the world. we are talking about nazis >> josh, let's not forget, the largest company on the council, walmart, 1.5 million employees has not re-signed. it was considered that a consumer-facing company would have to re-sign, because they could face a backlash or a boycott. walmart condemned the comments >> they rebuked the comment, not the man? >> exactly the ball is in the court of the ceos, including the ceo of the largest retailer in the world to see what they do >> i think actually some of these ceos are pulling kind of double duty on a number of these

different committees i think the list we just showed, correct me if i'm wrong, i think the name was on the advisory council. >> strategic and policy forum that just disbanded. that's where mcmilan was, unless my list is wrong on the manufacturing council. >> they don't have to re-sign. >> great point as always maybe just difficult solving the council prevents these ceos from one by one, after coming out and saying, here is why i am re-signing they don't have to rebuke the president directly >> i don't see the down side to re-signing >> they don't have to. >> the down side is somebody could say, hey, i'm going to your competitor, because you didn't take a stand. >> do you know that the number one investing trend, trls illio of dollars are shifting in this direct, esg, environmental, social and governance issues

institutions are arranging their portfolios so that the things they are investing in are jermaine to the values of the end recipients of that money, whether unions or endowments or charitable foundations you cannot be a chairman of a ceo of a publicly traded business and face these panels in terms of esg with a straight face >> scott, before we let you guys go, i want to ask shawna jaean n a question do you see there is going to be a breaking point for the stock market at some point, the investors get sick of everything they are dealing with >> they did it a week ago with north korea.

there were 100,000 of the vix 20 calls bought for 49 cents. 158,000 of the 28 calls with the vix at 11:40 today those are hedge funds doing that none thele nonetheless, there is zero priced in for mr. trump doing anything here. that's why the market continues to rise. this doesn't impact the market it impacts our psyche and everything else. >> we are going to do to amon javers outside trump tower >> reporter: so far, no reaction from the trump white house

will be with seen as no confidence it is headed by stephen schwarzman, of black stodelblac proud supporter of president trump. also, dug mcmill on and jim mcnerney and jack welch of general electric this is a high-powered, elite group of american business people who are collapsing and saying they can't continue to function as an advisory panel to this white house i can tell you that a person who is familiar with this, a member of the group, has told cnbc, that the thinking was, it was important to do this as a group today to disband this council, as a panel, not as individuals it would have more significant impact it makes a central point it is

not going to go forward. it is done we'll wait and see what the president's reaction is. the president has reacted angrily. the president is faced with a much larger group of some of the biggest names in the country each will have their own particular reasons and explanations for what happened we should wait to hear what they have to say. now, how does he repair his relationship with the business community? we will work to see if we can get any response

what do we know about a white house press briefing from the press secretary or others? are any of those things on the agenda today >> none of those things were condemn plated the president was scheduled to be here at trump tower until 2:00 p.m. and then go to bedminster, new jersey, where he has a golf course and a golf resort to continue this working vacation no opportunity was on the specific schedule to see president trump on camera. he is expected to sign a piece of legislation later on today in new jersey we were not going to see that on camera that may change. the president might feel he wants to respond the white house might feel they want to respond to this. i can't imagine anybody other than the president from this white house coming out to talk about this issue right now

if anybody speaks, it will be the president. everybody in the business and journalistic community will monitor the president's twitter feed where he reacts quickly or any indication that he wants to speak to the nation or make any comments about any of this so far, no confirmation from a white house official that i just spoke to a few moments ago they seemed unaware this was happening. they might not have gotten the word yet that was on going until a few minutes ago. the president priczed having these ceos to the white house. >> it is going to be a huge blow it will be interesting to see how the president reacts to this news he reacted to ken frazier by lashing out at him then, yesterday, he lashed out at the other executives who quit and claimed that the reason they quit was because they were

sending jobs overseas, which is preposturous they quit because they are embarrassed to be associated with this president. this white house is on fire right now. how do republican members of congress handle him? one texted me today and said, we are texting how to distance ourselves from him they are scared of the president's base he still has about a quarter of the american people who strongly approve of him, more than double that many strongly disapprove. he still has that base they play a role in republican primaries. this administration and at jen the agenda it has purported to push is in deep, deep trouble right now. >> in past administrations, this might well be a moment where the president sits down and gives a speech to the nation to try and

heal the divisions that have been unearthed over the past week or so do you think that's being contemplated >> tyler, he gave that speech yesterday at his news conference the problem for the administration is that the president has revealed who he is, what his character is, what his values are those are things that are out of step with the values and character of the majority of the american people. he has already shown his hand. we have seen his haan. i don't know that the president saying words that he self-evidently does not believe. on monday, he gave a statement at odds with what he said on saturday yesterday, when he spoke off of script, he went into even greater detail about the saturday statement

we know how he feels that's part of his problem >> so what about the white house staff? he has had some turmoil and turnover in the white house staff. are defections from it likely to follow >> i don't know, tyler john kelly, the former marine general, was brought in to try to bring some order to the white house. he has done that for the people that work for him. he works for the president the president is his own communications director and chief of staff, his own agenda center you remember the revealing comment that anthony scare scaramucci made that there are a lot of people that think it is their job to save the country from this president. there may be a lot of people that feel that way it may be gary kohn and john

kelly and it may be h.r. mcmaster they have to weigh, is it beneficial for me to leave or not. >> the president of the united states has just tweeted. rather than putting pressure on the business people of the manufacturing council and strategy and policy forum, i am ending both. thank you all. that's his initial response. >> the manufacturing council is gone >> earlier, i said the ceo of walmart had been on the manufacturing council. >> not anymore >> they were still on the manufacturing initiative there are a number of different councils there were two major ones. there are now no longer two. the president is saying he is disbanding it. it is pretty clear that the strategic and advisory council had decided to disband itself. >> it is classic trump you can't quit i'm firing you >> guys, just think about this

for a second the leaders of the national business community are now embarrassed to be associated with a republican president who says that he is pursuing an agenda to cut regulations and cut their taxes. it also tells you what the likelihood is that the difficult work needed for tax cuts and tax reform, how unlikely that is at this moment. it also goes to the point that jon najarian made, people in business have now disconnected themselves from expectations about the trump administration and fundamentals are going to drive this the question is whether any of this turmoil has the capacity to drive economic fundamentals. i don't think so it would have to be a much more cataclysmic political outbreak of turbulence.

right now, they have just said enough >> john mcnabb, vice chairman of the american leadership council that was formed to promote job creation and also a trump supporter. sir, thanks for joining us >> thanks. you have heard, i'm assuming, the discussion for the last 10 minutes, 20 minutes, half an hour, all day long weigh in here. what do you think of the situation with all the ceos abandoning the president >> first of all, i have been a chairman and a ceo of fortune thousand companies and lead director of two other fortune 500 companies. i am certainly not embarrassed about president trump. if i think about there were 3,141 counties in america. the president won 3,084 of them. his opponent won 57.

i think his base is very, very strong i am with the american leadership council as vice chairman, harold hamas a chairman of that and a colleague of mine. i was one of the founders of the trump leadership council, a very se senior group of men and women in ten different sectors, including defense, agriculture, manufacturing, energy, et cetera >> does that still exist >> american business is still solely behind the president. >> what if members do start to drop >> well, i haven't seen -- mr. puzder was on today. we all grow up differently i happen to have military experience where i was in jeopardy at times. i don't want to get into

charlottesville. what i will tell you about what i heard, chicken little and the sky is falling i don't believe that we just had earnings reports that are very, very strong the market cares about that. the market hasn't disassociated itself with our president. companies produce goods and services they hire people they pay taxes and they do that with two goals, to make a profit and to build shareholder value >> you are quite right that the market does not seem to be reacting to the tumult rand turmoil in washington and that surrounds the administration >> prit. . >> right i would not go quite so far to say it is still with the president. >> what i would say about that,

though, let me say this. i have said this now for a year and a half this economy runs on emotion and perception the president has brought that to the table he has done that we have that the market is at an all-time high household income is up >> the business climate, until the past two days, the sense in the business community was favorably disposed to the president's policies we are seeing now that a lot of people in business are separating themselves from him you said earlier that you are not embarrassed by the president. are you troubled by his statement surround whing what w on in charlottesville? >> what i'm troubled about is the reaction of the media to

that anything our president would have said, somebody would have found fault with it. i think this will blow over. i truly do these are words. the economy, i think, is very, very strong. he has got rid of $90 billion of regulations, which is money in each america citizen's pocket. >> i have to jump in here. tyler mathisen went to the university of virginia, lived in charlottesville. i went to high school in rural virginia where half the streets of my town were named after confederate soldiers we understand the issue. what we are talking about here is the president of the united states who is effectively i don't want to say condoning but saying there are problems on both sides saying the things he says that makes -- i'm not here to judge but what i am here to do is to point out that ceos have judged.

john, they have dropped out. they have abandoned the president. the cover of the drudge report, which is arguable will you a very pro trump website had said, big business abandons trump. other people are making that judgment these comments were wrong and they are harmful >> i'm not sure what i'm supposed to say about the president's comments i can tell you that categorically they and all of business hasn't abandoned the president. i think that's just what you just said or at least partially that i went to duke university twice. i got the distinguished flag from vietnam, grew up very pour. my four grandparents had seven years of education, two of them didn't go to school period i'm the american dream i care about this country. i love this country. i am going to stick with the president. >> we have i don't want to say

that we have defended the president but certainly stuck with the business angle on cnbc. >> that's right. >> we are part of the media. so we have been criticized for saying things that have seemed almost pro trump or pro business in this environment. this is something where even the staunchest of us, the ceos of america have left the president's side that's all we are saying >> what you just said is the ceos of america have abandoned the president. they haven't now, some have there is probably 30, 40, 20 i don't know what the number is. i was driving down from asheville where i live in the summers to greenville for this opportunity to get on the air, because i want to protect our president. i want to pretext the country. i wasn't involved in this. i didn't see what was going on

it was interesting, what's going on i am interested in that. i haven't heard anything from our american leadership council or my former friends and colleagues at the trump leadership council so to say that american ceos have abandoned the president is simply not true. >> mr. mcnabb, thank you for coming on. the cacophony today about this situation would have left a lot of people like you deciding not to come on i expect you are going to take a lot of grief for everything that you have said today. i thank you for being brave and saying it anyways, even though you are probably going to take a lot of heat for it >> i've taken a lot of heat my entire life. it is not a problem for me >> thank you, mr. mcnabb >> let's bring in andrew ross sorkin andrew >> i want to give you a little bit of background of what's taken place over the past 24 or 48 hours in terms of how this group ultimately disbanded, what

led to it. we had been hearing privately from a number of the ceos on this council raising a question of whether he will awan done thbandon this gr. >> united technologies is putting out a statement. even though president trump has tried to front run these, he is saying now that he, the ceoo. united technologies. earlier this year, i was asked to participate in this council i'm reading this off my phone. basically, similar to what we have heard from others >> in large part, because the president has now front run this statement, there is a draft statement that is being prepared, which i imagine we will see very soon from this council. just to the give you a sense of how this all happened, in fact, it didn't just happen because of

yesterday. they began calling each other on monday, monday night you could argue this was led by women to some degree larry fink and others joined there was an intent o create a phone call among the council on tuesday before the president doubled down on his remarks. >> andrew, i am so sorry kayla tausche has breaking news. >> reporter: andrew just mentioned that statement we were expecting to receive from the forum. we have obtained that. i want to read it to you before we get back to discussing some of the events. the statement i will read it in full, as our members have expressed individually over the past several days intolerance, racism and violence have

absolutely no place in this dri country and are an affront to core american values it was perceived as a bipartisan group of business leaders providing independent feedback to the president on accelerating economic growth. we believe the debate over foreign participation has become a distraction from our well-intentioned and sincere desire to aid vital policy discussions on how to improve the lives of everyday americans. as such, the president and we are disbanding the forum job creation and supporting an inclusive program for the agenda remain vitally important to the progress of our country. we are all united to see our country succeed. as we are getting piecemeal statements, and the president's tweet saying he has chosen to end this this statement says, the president and we are disbanding the forum. i imagine that there are going to be some tick-tocks from

andrew and others in the coming days about how this decision was reached. i'll send it back to you >> do we still have andrew on the line >> if i could pick up on this, we can fact check this right now. the president did not do this voluntarily. my sources say that steve schwarzman did not do this voluntarily, if you will he was pressured to do this in large part by the rest of the group. as i was saying before we got the statement, this conversation began on monday afternoon and evening among some of the council members about how to react and what to say. they had put together a plan to try to set up a phone call among that council on tuesday. this is before trump had doubled down on his comments and before he had played certain comments by the way about walmart in reacting to doug mcmillon's statement. it was that response in addition

to some of the other comments that made some people on the council feel very uncomfortable from what i understand there were several factions on this council steve schwarzman did push back jack welch pushed back they were not on the same panel. >> there are two of his more ardent supporters. >> andrew liverous pushed back >> the ceo who is the closest to donald trump i want to be clear, in what you are reporting, an excellent job as always, which is, and i know you probably have to be delicate with your words here if the president says, i have chosen to disband these councils, that is not factually accurate >> that is not factually accurate >> the councils decided to disband.

>> he was told the councils were decide tog d deciding to disband this he has front run this and said he decided to. >> that's the strategic and foreign part of it and the manufacturering jobs council which was still in existence quite a few of the defections had come from that manufacturing jobs council >> much of the early defections came from the manufacturing council. the conversations i'm talking about were what some people describe as the umbrella organization, which was led by steve schwarzman jamie dimon's role, the ceo of jpmorgan, was a complicated one, in part, because of his personal feelings and outrage about what the president had said yet, he is also the chairman of

the brt, business round table, on behalf of 200 ceos and because of that and the ambition and responsibility to have a seat at the table created let's describe it as a complication of what jpmorgan or jamie dimon could do it is worth trying to understand there was a lengthy phone call that took place this morning with virtually all of the participants many of them got on the call with the expectation it was going to get dissolved, pushing for it to get dissolved. the ceos of j&j, toby cos grchlt r grove. there was pushback about whether or not they should disband that is a little bit of the back story how this has transpired

and happened clearly, the comments yesterday that the president made really changed the dynamic. it was possible perhaps had those comments not been made that the council would have made a statement but not necessarily disbanded. >> andrew, stick around if you can and maybe you can do a little reporting on the side while we bring in marcus lemonus. your reaction? >> first, tyler, this knows that the economy is being driven solely by trump is somewhat laughable to me. there are good fundamentals that are happen wg theing with these companies. our jobs as ceos are to be stewards of our business we are entitled to a personal opinion. we are entitled to voice that. we need to be careful. i encourage a lot of these ceos to be careful in voicing an opinion that represents their

business or their share holders i, of course, along with the other ceos are horrified about what we are hearing and see frg this administration. as the ceo of "camping world," it is important to recognize, or the ceo of any company, that we speak for ourselves as individuals on public policy and speak for our companies as it relates to policy that affects our business obviously, this one does i am concerned about certain ceos dancing on the fence fearing retaliation. >> marcus, didn't you have a consumer facing business, camper world. if you were on one of these councils, would you think, wow, ihave to deal with consumers every day, are they going to look at the business poorly, because i am associated with the white house? >> there is no doubt that there is probably not many consumers in this country today that are in favor of what has been said

in the last couple days. if they are, quite frankly, don't shop at my business. the reality is tla thehat therea fear there is a fear of association this notion that the economy is all being fueled by this i think your previous guest said that that's more laughable than anything >> hey, marcus, i want to give you a little breaking news, which i can. >> nbc news has confirmed that vice-president pence will return from his overseas trip a day early. he was scheduled to leave friday morning. he will meet thursday night and meet with the president at camp david on friday. vice-president pence ending an overseas trip one day early. maybe it is a huddling up of the team to try to re-evaluate and restrategize as a guy that not only goes in and runs your own company but advises small businesses on how to handle problems, what would

your best advice be to the trump white house? >> i thatink that advice has tob very direct and sound about being quiet and cleaning things up i don't know what effect that is going to have. there is no doubt his idea around taxes around forum everybody is in favor. when you start to get into questioning people and questioning humanity and what the country stands for has t change i don't know how successful pence will be in delivering that message. in is one of those times to be quiet moments. >> marcus, hold on a second. we have to get back to andrew ross sorkin with breaking news. >> larry fink sending a memo to his employees about his decision to depart the council.

he writes, while i have disagreed with the president in certain instances, 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. i concluded i no longer in good conscience should participate in the forum. the events that occurred in charlottesville are nothing short of domestic terrorism. such racism and bigotry must not just be condemned but condemned unequivocally. in the last 24 hours, i have informed our clients on the forum and the chairman in my decision to re-sign. blackblock will continue to engage on public policy with government at all levels that is a statement just going to employees at blackrock this moment >> marcus, anything else you want to say? >> no. >> marcus lemonis joining us

>> let's bring in don bear, former white house director and chief writer for president clinton. what does the white house need to do? >> i think they need to recognize, i suspect the cool heads do, that this is a die tii rupture between president trump and this white house and american business leadership it is unprecedented in major proportions. they need to move quickly to try to calm the situation and have the president doing it for others if they think that is going to work. they need to begin to reach back out to business leaders one by one in small groups. he needs to apologize to them for putting him in the situation that he puts them in, if he hope toss bring them back around to be supportive in any way of the

agenda that he needs their help withment these ceos have been under pressure since charlottesville and more important since president trump's defiant tantrum yesterday. if it is not with the consumers, it is with their own people and their own employees who have raised a tremendous amount of pressure and concern within these companies about how they are going to respond the way forward is really for the president to reverse himself publicly and in private conversations as quickly as possible >> this is not something that comes naturally to this president fwlchlt ask that president. >> that's what i was going to say. >> i asked john harwood, is this a moment, and you have been a speech writer in the white house, is this a moment where the president needs to speak to

the country and actually take some of his words back >> the president has misused and abused the bully pulpit, which in many respects is the most important tool he has, his ability to lead the country through his words and the sentiments he expresses. he should try to give an oval office address to the nation and to the world in which he comes closer to explaining what the ideal of the american people is and how he is aligned with them, if he can do that. it has been very clear since this particular crisis erupted and frankly throughout the course of his presidency. >> could you write that speech for him? that's a tough needle to thread.

>> there are good writers who could work to do that. whether or not he would accept the words and sentiments, it is anyone's guess >> if we go back to the billy bush tape where he came out and his wife came out, that is not who i am, et cetera. tla wou that would appear to be the greatest crisis moment of the campaign we look to see how he obviously recovered from that. >> i think he needs to remember that defiant and defensiveness are not very good.

who knows whether this president has it in him to do it >> i worked for a president that had a crisis of his own, bill clinton. he was impeached it was a crisis, dominated the headlines. any policy objectives he may have had, domestic or international, were overshadowed by monica lawinsky how do you recover >> well, i was not working for him there. >> he was the president that you did serve under. >> wone of the things the president was good about was keeping the white house and his policies focused on the work of the american people even during the impeachment process. that is why and how he came through it

bill clinton got up every day to help move forward an agenda that is helping them. that came to be more and more dominant of the national agenda and national conversation. he did it. >> the first things he said weren't spot on, right the various things we could recount when he first responded to the whole situation he had to learn eventually that he had to be more forthcoming. >> which he did and he was >> he was more forthcoming he apologized to the country and his family and all those affected by it he moved forward he was able to assert an agenda and get back to work in the business of the american people. if donald trump wants to reverse this course, he is going to have to apologize in one way or another. he is going to have to speak to the people that have been offended by what he has said he is going to try to have to reestablish himself or establish himself as a leader who

recognizes and articulates the highest values of the american people and to be honest, what the country really wants, he has to stop the self-inflicted wound that are distracted him and his administration and the entire country from the real work at hand where is his infrastructure bill where is tax reform? >> let's bring jeff sonnenfield in for leadership studies. >> thank you good to be with you. >> what do you think about what has just happened? >> it is not surprising. it is breathtaking we could have predicted this self-immu lati self-immulation was going to come about i have heard from about 26 ceos. every one of them have been in

touch with their boards. there have been emergency board meetings and conference calls and they are deliberating. ken frazier was heroic he said, an enemy of the people, the strongest person in the world could stand alone. he showed his courage and everybody started to follow. the business round table is sitting on their heals we can talk about what i am happy to talk about. we never had so pro business sounding an administration since eisenhower people were so excited there was such enthusiasm. there was widespread support e even a lot of democrats were excited about deregulation >> i understand and i don't mean to interrupt i understand exactly what you said if you are advising a ceo who is in crisis, and i think we can say the president now is at the

center of a big hurricane, what do you tell that person to do? how can he reassert ownership of the presidency, if you will, the power to lead? how can he reclaim that? >> general kelly has to sit down and watch an episode or two of the apprentice and he will realize what a losing hand he has as the chief of staff. none of the initial 2017 vice-presidential candidates saw this coming as he mowed them down his modus aoperandi was divide and conquer. i told him in december and january, it is not going to work anymore. kelly has to understand that trump has to be told that his fundamental management style is flawed he can't admit a mistake the american public is enormously forgiving

whether or not it is salvageable. don baer might be right. >> i hear everything you are saying the country will have to move forward. the sun will come up this is currently our president. this is the president of the united states. he will remain our president for the next three years and some months and maybe longer. we have to go forward from this. how do we move forward as a country? how do we get someone to tell the president that he has to do things for the nation? >> the business community and those that he trusts you mentioned some like andrew liverous and steve schwarzman could work with him to show him. he is not a major business leader he never was he doesn't know these guys

this was his chance to get to know them. he was so honored. he is very smart he listens he doesn't read a lot of documents but he listens they could still try to show him, he has to show some contrition we are looking at something we have never seen, a president who has been dinuted the emperor has been told he is out there with nothing on and doesn't know what to do. to try to reweave that tap es tr tri. he is going to try to figure out how to bring them back on board. >> jeff sonnenfield of yale, appreciate it. >> let's bring in larry kudlow and jimmy konkukis jimmy, i am going to start with you. there is going to be a perception i have already heard it and i am

sure that michelle and tyler has, that the media is piling on the president. we have heard a guest earlier, mr. mcnabb, that did serve his country. he kind of took the anti-media slant as well. i want to ask you, do you believe that the media is, indeed, piling on or this is a crisis of proportions we can not pile on. the news speaks for itself >> i think this is a historic crisis never give any aid or comfort or anything nice about white supremacists or nazis. be very clear. they are bad people. he failed to xleclear that these are self-inflicted wounds. you have a pariah president.

you say, let reagan be reagan. we have already seen the let trump be trump i don't think much is going to get done from here on out. if he is unwilling or incapable of changing, the only thing he can do is what, foreign policy that's bombing somebody, markets are not going to do. or be a protectionist. markets aren't going to like that >> i like to be optimistic >> larry, i would love your response is there an opportunity that the republicans now have the cover, because of the crisis, as you put it, that the president is in, that republicans and maybe hopefully some democrats as well, have the political cover to go off on their own and get legislation like tax reform done where they don't have to necessarily deal with the

executive branch >> let me just jump into this very fast. remember, the key to the republican tax reform plan was that the business community was going to be all in to help support it and push it forward how is that plan looking right now? >> let's bring in larry kudlow >> i don't think the business community -- for various reasons, a percentage left the council. they're following their conscience and stake does that holders, fine. these things happen. i think mr. trump made it clear in his excellent speech on monday that he completely disavows any of these nazis, neo-nazis, racist, bigots, crazies. he said that during the campaign, even though that part of the media would not listen something similar is happening

should he give a speech someplace to absolutely clarify his view groans these hate groups sure, i think that would be a constructive, positive thing is this episode going to wreck his legislation regarding taxes? i don't believe it the ceos some of them said this, they agreed with the policy, you but didn't agree with the way he handled the so-called charlottesville crisis, they're entitled to that we can bet back to work. maybe my wording wasn't exactly right, and you were kind to me to let me apologize. i have known him a while, worked with him during the campaign, saw him a couple weeks ago i do not believe that donald trump is a hater. i do not believe that. i do not believe he is catering to any of these awful hate groups therefore i don't see moral equivalence here if anything, what he tried to say yesterday and it didn't

work, no question about that what he was trying to say was not moral equivalency, he was saying this left-wing violent antigovernment group, antifa, they were in the middle of the melee trying to hurt people, somebody needs to say that numbs number of times reported it yesterday was not a communications triumph, but i will repeat my view, he is not a hater and has disavowed all of these neo-nazi, white supremacists, whoever they might be it reminds me of my late mentor, william f. buckley jr., i miss him so much. many years ago he read the john birchers, who were crazy, ran him out of the conservative movement he read them out if anything -- >> larry, trump is reading them

back in. how hard is it to seem angry about nazis -- >> jimmy -- >> he's angry about amazon, can we agree with that >> let me finish my president point, friend. >> you bet. >> i think he's made it clear. >> i believe he doesn't want any part of that he can make that clear if he wants, but i'm using the buckley metaphor with respect to getting the birchers out if you want trump to give another speech, jim, fine, i'm all for it i wouldn't mind having a hand in writing such a speech, but i do not believe he has any sympathy for these hate groups. >> he certainly yesterday backed away from his stronger statements on monday i'm thinking back to the weekend. ted cruz, marco rubio spoke much

more forcibly and certainly more than he did yesterday. there is no -- i know you agree with this. there is no, no equivalence between bad behavior on one hand and unmitigated, pure evil on the other. that's what those people were who marched down the lawn where i lived 41 years ago with torches in their hands symbolmatic of what the ku klux klan did, shouting phrases like "jew will not replace us." that's unequivocal evil. >> tyler, he has said this if you go back to the campaign, early march debate, everyone was on his case, fox news i believe was sponsoring the case. he was so unequivocal about his opposition so any of these white

nationalist or supremacist groups to equate trump with the kkk marches with fire to burn down black churches or anything else, those way out of context, tie le he's not that man. he's not saying those things now, i think what senator ted cruz did in his public statements, and i will say the same thing about senator marco rubio, two friends of mine, was very good. if president trump would echo that, would underscore that with his own statements and speeches, i'm fine with that i'm absolutely fine with that. but i think folks are just going too far making a case against him that he has not done. >> so jimmy, why -- the you want pointed out there were, quote people a, good hombres versus bad hombres, so forth. if there were good people there in charlottesville on friday

night, the good people would have left, okay? that's my view jimmy, if larry is right here and the president has been unequivocal in his repudiation of hate groups, why hasn't he been heard >> he has now had multiple opportunities both giving statements, tweeting in front of the lectern, to show the same sort of passion, you know, that play of other republicans have, frankly that larry just did about this issue, and to clearly even from a written statement, to clearly say that this is unacceptable, that there weren't nice people. if you're marches with nazis and white supremacists you may call yourself an alt-right, and a nazer and white supremacist, and the good people either left or

saying you leave, you go home. why the president can't seem to summon that righteous anger that most americans have right now, he is doing this to himself. again, i -- is a conversation with mike pence at camp david going to change that i don't know. >> i feel like assist last night's news conference, that that was what they think the president definitively believe i don't think it's ever going to be -- >>we just saw trump. >> look, if you -- you're right, michelle these things sometimes just can't persuade people who are opposed. i don't think yesterday's press conference was his best moment i'm not making that case i think he confused and conflayed a lot of things that would very better left unsaid. i mean, if it were up to me, economist, policy adviser, i would have stuck to infrastructure, which i think is

a very good policy for growth, and i know my pal jimmy agrees with it. but he didn't. i have not spoken to him since, lord knows, those moments where he believes if you hit him, he has to hit back, all right and that's -- he's the president, he was elected, i was not. it's not my style, but that's what he did. >> i hear your point. >> no, i don't think it helped him. >> he didn't get -- had he got one infrastructure question, he said are there any infrastructure questions and of course there were not i was surprised there was one, okay because the media will latch on, and this is obviously a massive issue, but the president can also be blamed for that, larry, as you not only worked in the white house, but also in the media for a long time, why did she allow himself to take the bait he does not is frame if the dialogue you know the next number of press conferences will be all about this, as they should be. hold that thought. we've got some breaking news we

have to get to we'll come back. hey, guys, morgan brennan here with breaking news regarding ge, specifically ge's chairman through the end of the year, jeff immelt, in a statement, he notified members of the manufacturing council this morning that he could no longer serve on the manufacturing council saying, quote, the president's statements yesterday were deeply troubling, there would be no ge without all peoples races, genders and sexual owner yenations. ge has no tolerance for hate, bigotry, and the white supremacist is extremism that the country witnessed last weekend. he goes on to say that he joined this panel because ge exports over $20 billion of american-made goods to the world and he believed we are best served when we constructively engage with leaders in the u.s. and around the world, but that given the recent events, the

ongoing tone of the discussion, that he no longer feels that this council can accomplish these goals. that's a statement from jeff immelt back over to you. >> morgan brennan with comments from ge's outgoing ceo, thank you. well, there's other stuff going on, by the way, in washington federal reserve minutes are out right now. let's get to hampton pearson >> the minutes show monetary policy makers basically struggling to balance concerns about the decline in inflation with signs of a job market that continue toss tighten. some participants expect inflation to remain over the 2% target, committee members observing, quote, they could afford to be patient in deciding when to increase the fed funds rate others were concerned about the pressure from a labor market that was already at full employment and can still tighten further. still we got no launch date, by the way, for when the fed might

begin reducing the portfolio, deciding basically to wait until the next meeting when they would have more information on overall economic conditions. there were monetary policy makers at the july meeting who wanted to announce a date at that time. looking overall at the economy and what monetary policy makers were looking at, the overall economic activity rising moderately, household spending, business investment continuing to expand, real gdp growth, they say, has turned up in terms of speed bumps and concerns overall, there is a concern among monetary policymakers about basically what's not happening with fiscal policy and the federal government, concerns about the slow pace of fiscal trade, health care policymaking weighing down spending and hiring in the private sector, and again the chances for the overall economy to improve there's concerns it will, back to the labor market, about substantially overshooting that

full employment target, and concerns about how to engineer a soft landing, looking at financial markets, concerns about the low level of long-term interest rates in particular u.s. treasury securities, those lower yields some monetary -- inducing investors to take on more risk than perhaps what is warranted. back to you. >> hampton, thank you very much for the summary of the fed minutes, to bob pisani on the floor for reaction to those minutes. bob? >> and fairly modest i think the key phrase down here, i heard a couple people say were struggling to reconcile the desire to increase rates, the inflation issues being below expectation, of course, how to reduce their bond portfolio. struggling is the keyword here that stood out to me you saw the brief drop about an hour ago that of course was on the reaction to the president disbanding the business council. cost us about 50 points on the dow jones industrial average, make five points on the s&p 500.

we did see a slight move to safety, so bond prices went up, yields went down as you look at the ten-year down into negative territory, also more po flight to safety evidence the dollar weakened a bit gold moved to the up side a bit. gold moving into positive territory now after being down recently, and then we saw, of course, bank stocks also moving down as the bond yields move to the down side. kbe in negative territory. guys, back to you. bob, thank you very much let's bring in former dallas fed adviser danielle booth larry kudlow, economist, still going on let's talk about these fed minutes here what stuck out to you? >> it's pretty significant, what bob was saying in terms of struggling i was expecting for there to be a huge -- this is not falling cell phone bills there's something else fundamental drawinging down inflation that clearly has policy makers worried enough to

use the word "struggling." the markets will realize the fed no longer has this september launch date. hampton said there's no time say tony to reducing the balance sheet. so this is definitely given what fed speakers have said, including jenny yung, they're stepping back. this was a very dovish statement. >> i'm looking to see if the market responds positively. >> it should. >> guys, what are you telling me larry kudlow, we want to weigh in on the fed minutes and the market reaction is the dow is much 41 points. >> doi moves to session lows. i'm dying to i do at one point want to come back to sully's question about trump in charlottesville the fed should stay back you've seen the actual inflation prints are going to say 1.5% that's low i regard that as a very good

thing. i regard that as a tax cut for consumers and businesses, real incomes are doing pretty well. real retail sales are doing well and real profits are doing well. i don't september the fed's model that inflation has to rise you can see it in the market price indicators the forward-looking, not just the prints, but the forward-looking indicators over the last several years, i know we've had ups and downs over the last several years, gold, commodity indexes, tips, break-even inflation, all that stuff has been remarkably stable, which means there's no inflation in the air, and as far as the fed normalizing, temperature they've done a pretty good job, believe it or not. now what they need is tax cuts in order to get a faster economic growth so they can follow religious rates higher. i wouldn't rush the normalization. i would wait. >> clearly there's no rush to normalize, but again this is an about-face from the strong

language that shrinking the balance sheet would have absolutely no impact on the markets. they would do this on autopilot. they're pulling back from the strong positioning, and the bond marked should sit up and pay attention. >> thank you, larry, thank you, danielle back to the big story of the day, and that is -- >> one statement. >> go ahead. >> please. i want to answer sully 'questions i want to be unequivocal any group, any group on this planet and asked who is the worst group? you looked at all the groups, who is the worst group the answer is the nazis and neo-nazis. that is my personal view, and i believe it's trump's views, these are the worst people on the planet, always have been, always will be i completely reject any of that stuff. trump, i'm just saying, i think he rejects it, too, but i'm just speaking for myself.

let there be no confusion about my opinion about those crazy people none whatsoever. >> spoken from the heart and the soul. >> thank you. here is the president's motorcade leaving. there's sort of a line of dump trucks provides security for trump tower. he is on his way to the wall street helipad where he will board marine one, on his way back to his summer residence in bridgewater at the trump national golf course reports are he will spend a day or two there until moving to camp david, the presidential retreat that he has visited i believe maybe once since becoming president, maybe not at all. let's go to andrew ross sorkin for breaking news. >> a little more news about this ceo council that has been disbanded, a note going out to employees of jpmorgan from its ceo jamie dimon.

he writes -- i strongly disagree with president trump as reaction to the events that took place in charlottesville. racism, intolerance and violence is always wrong. there's no room for equivocation the evil on display of these perpetrators of hate should be condemned and has no place in a country that draws strength from diversity and humanity he talks about the company and company's role in values, and fans divisiveness is not the answer regular torrie policies are not enough and will not matter if we do not address the divisions in our country. it's a leader's role to bring people together, notary them apart, taking a direct aim at the president. he says today the members of the strategier policy forum agreed to dysband the group put out its own statement, but i wanted you to understand why i personally supported this decision and how strongly i feel about these

issues this statement going to employees moments ago at jpmorgan. >> andrew, thank you very much, following the story for us from new york city. we're now joined by kayla tausche and john harwood kayla, you first soinchts we want to bring our viewers up to speed. the president tweeting rather than putting pressure on the business people of the manufacturing council and policy forum, i am ending both. thank you all. it was a departure from the president's posture yesterday when faced, and then he said they are all replaceable later at his press conference at trump tower said they were doing so, because they were ashamed they weren't creating jobs in the united states, and instead were producing their products overseas then today there was another waterfall, if you will, of companies coming out and stating their executives would no longer serve on these councils, whether

it was the manufacturing council or this strategic policy forum, because of the president's choice yesterday to revert to his original remarks regarding the charlottingville violence campbell's soup johnson & johnson, united technologies, blackrock, ge, saying they could no longer in good conscience support the president on that front. he got a statement from the forum that was drafted just moments ago that in part said we believe the debate has become a distraction from our well-intentioned and sinre desire to aid vital policy discussions on thousand improve the lives of everyday americans. as such, the president and we are disbanding the forum job creation and supporting an exclusive pro-growth agenda remain vitally important to the progress of the country. we should know in addition to the manufacturing council and the strategy & policy there was a third council assembled in june, ce american tech council, met with

the american office of innovation, to figure out how the technology sector could move forward with the government. i'm told by executives invited to those meetings, it was never a formal assembly, there were no follow-up and no meetings scheduled since then for that reason there's nothing to resign from, because it was never something that was formally operationalized there's been questions from viewers on where people stand on that specific council. finally with regard to a lot of these executives, while it was the charlottesville response, i'm told by many executives and republican strategists that really the paris accord represented the slope from which they started slips a love the companies said they were disappointed in the white house's stance, but at that time didn't feel strongly enough to resign and still believed they could make a positive impact some still believe they can make a positive impact by remaining engaged, but obviously these

forums will not be how they to do back to you. andrew has more reporting. andrew >> i just wanted to revisit if we could a bit of the ticktock of what's taken place over the past 48 hours and how this took place, and in particular to acknowledge there was a conversation taking place some steve schwartzman on behalf of the council and the white house over the past 24 hours, where he had been indicating to is the white house, my sources are saying, to explain to them just exactly what this council was thinking about, was perhaps planning for in fact, a draft of the statement we are now seeing and bringing to was actually made yesterday afternoon before the call was even taking place this morning i had earlier reported there had been some divisions on this council and there were. early on larry fink and were

early movers, we talked about mary barra, and steve schwartz man, early on in the conversation on monday were not as i clined to make the move to disband, but really that tuesday on both in terms of the comments that the president made doubling down -- and i mentioned it earlier. i think the comments in response to both the tweets from ken frazier at merck, and in particular at doug mcmillen at walmart, that comment that was made yesterday afternoon, that's what may have been broken the camel's back, if you will. by last flight it was relatively clear that this group did want to disband we talked about whether this president had done this voluntary. i do believe that now that we have talked to more sources that by this morning, or at least during this phone call that steve schwartzman was resigned to in fact deciding this entire

thing had to end >> but just to underline, when he had fought back against the ceo of merck and walmart, that appeared to be the breaking point for some of these? >> i think the combination of doubling down on the comments tuesday afternoon for a majority of members of this council, plus the reaction in those comments from walmart, and also in reaction to what he said to ken frazier really pushed people in a way emotionally that got them to a place where they felt that disbanding, and a statement was not going to be enough one of the possibilities and options put on the table on monday had been -- could we put on the a statement com democrats what the president said? clearly there were enough people pushing to disbanding, but by tuesday afternoon, i think the die had been cast.

thank you very much, andrew. did you want to jump in? >> i think this goes without saying here, before we bring in dick kasavo president sich, any of the ceos have left either council, you're probably watching, or one of in your office is, we invite you to come on, explain your position, tell america, your shareholders, your employees why you either left on your own or decided to disband one or both of neurocouncils we would welcome all of you on the program. i think it goes without saying. dick, welcome. good to have you with us i had a whole set of questions lined up an hour and a half ago based on what i was told you were likely to say, and all of those questions kind of go out the window now i'll begin with a simple one

i was very interested in your perspective on when to join and when to leave one of thinks councils i know you'll get to that, but your overall reaction of what transpired in the last two hours. >> well, it's unbelievable in some ways but i would ask, i guess, everyone including those who decided to go on the council is, are you really surprised is there anything here that's happened that was totally unexpected donald trump throughout his business career, throughout the entire campaign, has been narcissistic, uncouth, and probably did it in spades in weekend, but that's who the man is if you decided to go on a council such as this, you shouldn't be surprised there would be on times when you would have serious disagreements with him and, again, maybe not to the

same extreme that happened here, but certainly similar to it, and you either made that decision appropriately or you did not, but it shouldn't be surprising that it's come to something like this, in my opinion. >> in other words, if you make the decision to go on with your eyes open, knowing the individual who is inviting you to be a part of the council, you should have been prepared for hitching yourself to a bucking bronco, basically. right? >> exact lly there's nothing wrong with hitching and if a particular policy comes up, you disagree with you, you say you disagree. >> and if the president can't handle it, his fires you or disinvites. >> but when you resign, you are absolutely embarrassing the president. i'm saying are you resigning

behalf this act? or did you make the it right decision when you decided to join why are you surprised? that's my question >> let me come back to you i don't know your politics at all. i honestly don't had you been asked either as a private citizen, which you are now, or as the ceo of wells fargo, which you were, had you been asked to join which, what would you have done? knowing mr. trump. >> let me just saying i had been saying on cnbc since the early primaries and was asked by many people who have been on here in the last half hour or so, and said that i could not vote for donald trump, that i believe he is and always will narcissistic, uncouth and offensive, and i would likely not agree with his policies, even his economic

policies, therefore i could not vote for him and therefore i couldn't be part of an administration or anything else. it's just -- we have totally different opinions of how to approach issues and how to approach being a president >> but there are a lot of ceos who felt that way, dick at the time, but remember, go back to the moment he surprised everybody, nobody expected him to win. he's very pro-business and there's this moment where he's the new president of the united states, or the president-elect, and he calls you up and asks you to serve to some degree. it's pretty hard to say no you think you would have had the strepgt to say no? >> i would have had the strength i don't know whether i would have done so, but i would have -- in making that decision, i would have said, i know that i am going to have some very serious differences with this president, so can i handle that

personally is this good for my company? is this good for my stakeholders because i felt so strongly about those differences before, i think it would have been unlikely i'm not here to say how i would have handled it. i'm just saying i don't know why they're surprised. >> is it hypocrite cal for them to step off now? >> i don't know that you have to make your own decisions, but i would say it's really, really embarrassing for the president of the united states that in the midst of all of this that people then resign. all i would say is -- you didn't know you're an accomplice in this, is all i'm saying. >> once you go on, the bar for resigning gets really, really high, in your view. >> really, really high. >> it better be such an

intolerable set of circumstances. >> higher than this? >> exactly -- well, again, i -- >> every has to draw their different bar. >> that's the issue, but the bar goes way up s i don't knows that it reached this for everyone or should have, or whatever, but the decision you make at the beginning puts you in the situation you find yourself in today. >> let me turn it 25 degrees to the port side here there were people who were active and currents on this strategic forum and manufacturing forum, and former cos like jack welch. is there a difference, therefore, in the thought process that goes into whether you're going to accept an appointment or invitation or not? in other words, how do you factor in, if you're leading a company the various constituencies, your board, your

shareholders, your employees, your customers s. >> well, i think there is a difference that's why you have to be very careful. you know, in my opinion, when you make a decision like this, you are making a decision as primarily as a citizen of the united states. you are trying to decide what's best for the country when you're advising a president on a particular policy, what's good for the country might even be bad for your company, but you cannot let that stand in the way of giving your advice and your experience for what's best for the country. so at any particular time, you are exposing to some extent your own personal desires and maybe even your stockholders', but that's your responsibility you're a citizen first if you can't handle that, if you can't be able to juggling

pressures from both sides, you should not put yourself into the situation where you are on the council. >> so let's talk about how we move forward if you're a ceo, and you were a ceo not only of a massive company, but perhaps the most regulated industry in the united states, when trump won, when the gop swept, there was some optimism that the trump/gop agenda of deregulation, tax reform, infrastructure would be maybe not a lay-up, but certainly a fairly easy shot so you make adjustments. what does corporate america do now? how do you plan to run a company in a regulated environment when you have no idea what kind of legislative agenda or changes may not actually occur out of washington, d.c. heck, you're not even sure you have a president that can rally the gop troops anymore >> well, it's going to be certainly more difficult

i think what's going to happen is that these meetings and advice and counsel will now go to the departments and bodies of each industry. they're still going to ask -- >> i'm sorry to jump in. it's just a time issue and i apologize for cutting us off take us inside the boardroom saying you're still running wells fargo when this is going on, you have a board meeting, you walk in, what is being said? what strategy and business plans are being laid out, given the political environment? i'm sure politics, not partisan, but political and regulatory scheme-up must go into the thinking take us into the boardroom that's what i would suggest. we still have to communicate now, not just through these

councils, but with the various regulators, the treasury department if you're in banking, the treasury department and so on, because the suggestions that are being made are still very positive, deregulation objectives are still very positive for the economy so is the tax policies and so forth, and it's going to take longer and be more different, but i don't see the communication being different, just who you communicate with different. >> thank you so much, dick, for your time today. more on this breaking news, the president disbanding various, austan goolsbee, marc morial and many more are coming up. the nasdaq has turned negative "power lunch" is back in two minutes. ...it starts a chain reaction... ...that's heard throughout the connected business world.

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during long bubble baths. tv on every screen is awesome. the xfinity stream app. all your tv at home. the most on demand your entire dvr. top networks. and live sports on the go. included with xfinity tv. xfinity, the future of awesome. let's go to john harwood >> brian, we have a situation in the white house that i think we need to put in context a president with extremely low approval ratings, sub-40%, a shrinking base, is now faced the defection shun by large number of business allies at the time he was seeking to both cut their taxes and cut their regulations. that's an indication of how much danger this president is in right now. we see from his conduct in the

last few days that he feels intensely about the events in charlottesville. he insisted on broadcasting that to the nation yesterday after he tried to correct his earlier statements on monday, but that has ohm made the difficulty work what that does is puts added pressure on his relationship with republicans in congress as well as the business community and his ability to move his agenda, guys >> thank you, eamon javers is in new york. >> reporter: brian, thank you, the president just left trump tower on his way to his golf club where he's going to continue this working vacation he's been on for the past several days it's been anything but stress-free form the president tweeting within the hour or so that it was in fact his decision, he says, to disband the ceo council form the president's tweet says -- rather than putting pressure on the business people of the forum and council, i am ending both.

thank you all. we have a statement from jamie dimon as well, saying in a statement to his employ crease, the equality treatment to all people is -- there's no room for equivocation, the evil on display should be condemned and has no place jamey dimon also going on to say, i strongly disagree with president trump's reaction to the events that took place in shaltsville, racism is wrong and always wrong, jamie dimon says there. so as we continue to get these statements rolling in, who are members of these various policy forums, this is going to be seen politically as a vote of no confidence by america's business community in president trump wait and see further reaction from the president himself i talked to a white house official as all this was breaking, which simply referred my to the president's tweets they have no other comment here from the white house staff other

that that what the president has said so far. back to you. thank you very much, eamon let's bring in austan goolsbee what might this mean for getting things done. a lot of hope was around this president. some of that seems to be fading, what do we do? feels like it's slowly transforming himself from unlikely hero on business interests in the republican parties, more like into you're seeing leading business figures who are not very political usually, who are willing to service on these types of

advisory boards they said, no we're willing to do so, not because we're giving a political endorsement, but because we're patriots, we want to serve the country. when you see those guys bailing out, that's not a good sign for your agenda. i think they'll have a hard time getting stuff done i think this is your basic nightmare for a guy like gary kohn or any of the get things done caucus, if you want to call it that, within the white house. they can't go out of their house to a restaurant without the press getting in their face and asking them why are you still serving the administration do you disagree with what the president just said? >> i don't know if the heard dick earlier, but gary kon, knows who the president is he signed up for this. >> there's a whole separate question i was on one of these advisory

boards, the digital economic board of advisories the last year or two of the obama administration, and was the carryover. the second donald trump was elected, resigned from the board, because i think for anyone, the writer should have been on the wall gary kohn got him -- i'm not going to excuse that, but i think kohn and others on the economic policy size, you know, you talk to business people, a lot of the business community thought, yeah, we don't agree with some of the things what he said about immigration, various groups of people, but he's not going to spend his time fighting those battles, he's going to spend time deregulating, cutting taxes. i think they're slowly realizing he's not doing anything he doesn't want to do, and the

campaign was a perfectly good indicator of what he wanted to do >> ultimately it's congress who makes laws is there any hope to see here in congress they come together on any kind of tax -- to have something to show as a wind when it comes to the mid terms to distance themselves from everything related to president trump? >> maybe you would have to talk -- first able to do so on health care. i think there will be less possibly -- than there was for cutting, repealing -- so the door might be open, but it's

still, if you're paul ryan, if you're brady, somebody who is trying to draft a tax bill, this went from being a distraction to being the then that everyone asks you, for me, all thence lead to the musical "hamilton. there's a wonderful, one song "the room where it happens" where erin burr was being 'grieved these ceos went on they panels, because they wanted to be in the room where it happens, right they wanted to influence for their countries, maybe -- who's going to be in the room where it happens now. off-line with the president to make sure their interests are still reflected? >> you know, that's a

tremendously important point the first is when you --, part of it is an administration likes to associate itself with reputable people, you know, people with good reputation, and that even if they're not giving a political endorsement, it's -- whatever is the op sid of guilt by association,ist credit by open association the second is exactly what you say s. form the panels to see advice donald trump is going to lose the imprimatur they won't provide it privately, because the minute that breaks,

the companieses are very uncomfortable and so i think if any ceo is caught privately -- they're going to be -- >> a suismt tan, thank you. >>. all the major averages are at session mode. the fed minutes were very dovish, and there could also be concern about the trump agenda being derailed let's get to phil lebeau a statement from gm's ceo mary barra regarding leaving the foruming we won't reed all of it to you, but general motors is about unity and inclusion, and so am

i. recent events it can lay already those in shaltsville and its aftermath require that we come together as a country and reinforce values, including tolerance, inclusion and diversity. that's the staismt from mary barra on the disup and downing >> phil you very much. we have marc morial, former mayor of new orleans, mr. mayor, welcome. good to have you with us >> thank you, ty >> we've been talking about the news at hand, which is the disbanding of these two advisory panels, but i want to turn it back to one i know you can speak

about in a most heartfelt way. you're the mayor of new orleans, a lot of confederate war statues. i'd like to hear you talk about thor symbols broadly and react to what i'm told was the response of the current mayor down there, mr. landrieu, to move many, if not all of those into a museum. is that a smart way to handle this >> you know, ty, it's interesting. 25 years ago when i was in the louisiana senate, we debated those monuments. i argued way back then that the appropriate place for those monuments was not in the public square, but in a mea assume in a public square, it suggests an endorsements of what those statues and penalties represented. as boy in new orleans, i would walk past the beauregard statue.

i always asked, why is it here after you learned history. he leapted a losing proposition in the civil war and what he represents is an adherence to and promotion of slavery it left deep personal wounds on people new orleans took many, many years too the most recent issue, which is the removal of those statues led by mayor mitch landrieu, and it was a direct result of the mother emanuel, if you will, tragedy when the governor of south carolina finally supported the removal of the confederate flag from the grounds of the state capitol ins south carolina it's important for us to recognize about this symbols they symbols and statues were put up not immediately following

the civil war, but many put up in the late 1800s, in an effort to say -- to celebrate the decline, if you will, of reconstruction and the of my versus ferrets son and the rise of the jim crow philosophy of separate but equal, so to speak. so they statues were put up all throughout the south as a political movement designed to redefine the civil war, not as a war for slavery, but as a war where the south's cause was indeed just. so it's taken this long for us to reconcile the monuments have no place in modern american history. i say this to you, ty -- >> marc? i had a question -- i'm sorry. were you finished? >> i was going to touch on the latest he event. this is unprecedented in the number of american business

leaders who are publicly distancing themselves from the president of the united states, but i'm going to applaud their courage and their public stance. i think because what it represents is them saying our shareholders, our customers, our employees, those people, our board members, those people that we have a responsibility for do not -- do not support in any way, shape or form what the president spoke yesterday, which was an unprecedented, as i watched it, i was stunned, and i was shaken, that this is the president of the united states in effect embracing the philosophy of a david duke unprecedented and we as americans have a moral obligation to stand up millions lost their lives in world war ii to fight again nazism. with cannot allow it to be legitimized. >> what we are saying was so

interesting -- there's a conversation with larry sabado the other day, and they talked about, for example, thomas jefferson, a founder of uva, and an owner of slaves so a lot of people ask, where do you start to draw the line as to what's an acceptable statue in certain places how do you frame your thinking around that question >> i have always framed it around the fact that jackson, robert e. lee, jefferson davis, led an armed insurrection against the united states of america in an effort to protect the snugs of slaveinstitution oy they committed treason against the united states. why i would not in any way sanction washington or jefferson owning slaves, they were

certainly the founders of the country that gave us a constitution that this generation has shaped, this generation has improved to support this concept of equal justice under law. so that's where the confederacy is different these were losers. who puts up statues to losers? they lost a war, committed treason, and only the death of lincoln and the administration of jefferson was why they were not jailed or faced execution. those who committed treason in those days would >> i get the point mr. mayor, that is correct you. >> mr. morial, thank you. >> thanks for having me. before we go, let's get a check on your markets, we are near session lows. in fact the dow sold off -- the council stuff really started to crumble around 12:45 eastern time, the dow sold out about 60

points in the thes 30 to 45 minutes. again mildly up, but well off their highs, the dollar moving as well, and following the fed minutes, which were very dovish, gold actually spiked higher, the benchmark following as well following the fed minutes. much more on your big breaking news story of the day we are back with "power lunch" we are back with "power lunch" right after this he's on holiday. what do you need? i need the temperature for pipe five. ask the new guy. the new guy? jack trained him. jack's guidance would be to maintain the temperature at negative 160 degrees celsius. that doesn't sound like jack. actually, jack would say, hey mate, just cool it to minus 160 and we're set. good on ya. oh yeah. that's jack. good on ya. if only the signs were as obvious when you trade.

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hi, don peebles is founder chairman and ceo of the peebles -- a bit of a lighthearted moment on a very serious and troubling day in many respects. as a democrat and as a man, you have been actually fairly supportive of president trump. i think you have surprised us all on this set a number of times. can you support him in any way now? >> no. look, as a democrat and an entrepreneur, i was willing to give donald trump a fair look and keep an open mind. as a pro-business democrat, i was cautiously optimistic that

he would use entrepreneurship and a pro-business agenda to level of playing field for minorities in women. in fact, i said that many times on your program. but at this point, look, i think donald trump told us during the campaign where he would take us, backwards, as a nation he said he wanted to make america great again. america's best days are ahead of us, and we have always strived to be a more person nation, so he clearly wanted to take us back to a time where none of us want to be the fact of his willing willingness to die nounce racism and anti-semitism as a leader of the most powerful nation in the world is astonishing >> larry kudlow made the case passionately that he's been strong and i don't know if he

used the word unequivocal in his condemnation of the far right and the hate groups and so on and so forth if that is true, i don't know whether you agree if that's true, why is he not being heard or conversely, why is he unable to to hear himself? >> well, i think the first thing is he's not willing to listen to other people around him. i think he's hearing himself, clearly. and i think he's stubborn, he's articulating a view that he obviously shares you know, but look, when it comes to racism and anti-semitism and fairness, you can't walk a gray line it's not gray. it's black and white and so, what is missing is the fact that he did not stand up and emphatically say that these people have no place in this country and they have no place in his administration and he does not want their support. then he could have gone on and said, of course, violence by

anybody, law-breaking, by anybody, is not acceptable he did not articulate compassion for the young woman who lost her life he talked about himself and how her mother complimented him, because it's all about him it never has been with him about this nation. it's been about him. and you know, i'm disappointed in myself. that i actually kept an open mind because, you know, at the end of the day, he told us what he was going to do he told us what he thought and mya angelo once say, tells you who they are, believe them and i didn't i thought we could look beyond it and i think that's what is happening now, but i think what's going to be important here to remember is, look, president in timesof trouble are supposed to unite the nation not divide it. and that drought, my lifetime, every president has stood up, when there's been some challenge to our democracy or our system and united the nation. this time around, this president

has divided us but i believe that ultimately his conduct and the conduct of what happens took in charlotte is going to have the opposite affect of what these racist groups intended and that would be to unite our nation and make us a more perfect nation i believe that the democrats and republicans in congress are going to begin to work together now. they have joined forces, many of them, to denounce his behavior >> all right, don, thanks very much appreciate you being with us, as always all right. we're going to have more market coverage and more coverage of the situation in washington right after this as we see the dollar move to session lows, gold move higher, and the marriage averages in positive territory, but off the highs of the discussions at the top of the 2:00 hour. don't move we'll be right back.

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ceos today let me start with you, we have had numerous guests on, one ceo defended the president at this point and dick, former ceo of wells fargo not necessarily a supporter of the president at all, but thought it really scratched his head as to why they were stepping down. they should have known whatthe were getting into when they joined the councils in the first place. anything you want to say here at this point >> i don't agree with that i think, look, the country was trying to come together after an election that was hard fought and surprising, and it's honorable to try to serve your country and serve the president. i don't think these individuals anticipated that he would walk back statements, twice, you know, that, you know, really called neo-nazis and white supremacists what they are, which are hateful americans that have no place in the town square this is a turning point for the trump administration

i think unlike anything we've seen to date, you know, this -- these ceos disbanding this organization, let's be clear, they disbanded it, he didn't you're going to see a ripple effect that lasts i think for days now more ceos denouncing him, more public statements from these individuals. and i think many members of congress are going to continue to come out and say things more strongly than we've seen in the past >> are you convinced of that, jared? this is a real turning point and just to push back a little bit. i really thought i was going to be in seoul, korea, this week, right, because of what was going on last week and now we haven't mentioned north korea until right now. three days we could be talking about something else. >> look, one little piece of this narrative is that as we've been looking over here, that situation may have settled down a bit. so perhaps that's a silver lining i agree with everything -- >> north korea backing down, but completely unnoticed >> but in a way that just goes

to shows you the thing you want donald trump to do most is not screw things up. not screw up foreign policy, and not screw up the economy, and, you know, he's making it hard to even do no harm. and i agree with everything sarah just said, i do think that these business folks knew what they were getting into when you play with a rattlesnake, you get bit they may not have realized at the extent it was going to hurt. the economy as many people, including trump have said, is soold, but i think people are realizing more and more that this president simply is not up to the task of either uniting the country or dealing with the many, really extoe sensual challenges we've face. we've elected the wrong guy in my view. >> this is such a hot day news wise that jared has removed his tie for the first time ever. >> thank you, yeah

>> i want to ask a question that i just asked don, the president and some of his supporters seem to think that he has been clear enough and explicit enough inhis denunciations of white supremacist groups, the kkk,s so forth, if he has been clear enough why isn't his message being heard? and if he hasn't been clear enough, sarah, why can't he hear himself? >> these are great questions he has he has denounced them. he denounced them, the first thing he tweeted on saturday morning, he said there's no room in america for this kind of hate he should have stopped there i think the challenge is he wants to win on a technicality any criticism, any report that he doesn't believe is fair, he digs in, and his failure -- i don't think he thinks that these neo-nazis are okay people, i don't know why he said it. i can't imagine he thinks

they're okay he has a jewish son-in-law who sits a few feet down in the west wing can't possibly think that, but he -- his blind hatred of the media, his blind hatred for his enemies and his ego calls him him to dig in and put himself in an even worse position than he was in the day he started this it's really dumbfounding. >> tyler, i think your question answers itself if he had satisfactorily distanced himself from this evil, we wouldn't be having this discussion we wouldn't be the having the discussions we've been having for the last couple of hours clearly he has done no such thing. and that is a tremendous, not only missed opportunity, but really a crisis of the presidency, just unfolding in realtime before our eyes. >> jared, sarah -- do you have a final thought, sarah >> i was going to say, priest presidents, if they would have put that statement out on saturday morning, it probably would have ended there