Former Goldman Sachs COO Gary Cohn talks on the phone as he waits for the start of a meeting with President-elect Donald Trump at Trump Tower, Tuesday, Nov. 29, 2016, in New York. (AP/Evan Vucci)
Since his inauguration, President Donald Trump has met with at least 190 corporate executives, not including phone calls with heads of banks or his numerous Wall Street appointees, the watchdog group Public Citizen reported Monday in a new analysis.
And since the November election itself, he’s met with at least 224.
“One of every five of the corporate executives who met with the Trump administration within the first 100 days represented the banking or financial sector, a particular focus of Trump’s criticism during the campaign,” Public Citizen noted in a write-up of its findings.
The group’s report comes just days after the Trump administration announced it would not disclose visitor logs from the White House, Trump Towers, or the president’s Mar-a-Lago resort to the public.
With those documents unavailable, Public Citizen developed its analysis via news reports and White House press releases.
The gatherings reflect the administration’s interest in giving special treatment to corporate sectors, such as Big Pharma, banks, and the automotive industry, among others—and it’s yet another example of Trump breaking his “drain the swamp” campaign promises, Public Citizen said.
“Donald Trump has asked America’s CEOs for marching orders, and in meeting after meeting, they are happily issuing instructions,” said the group’s president Robert Weissman. “As best anyone can decipher what’s going on at the White House, the CEOs are in charge now—and they are predictably advocating their narrow, short-term profitability interests, not what’s in America’s interest.”
Sheldon Adelson, David Koch, and Carl Lindner III are among the wealthy benefactors that Trump has met with in his first 100 days; he’s also entertained JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon, Andrew Liveris of Dow Chemical, and Doug McMillon of Wal-Mart, along with four separate executives from Fox News.
“President Trump not only has betrayed the promises of candidate Trump by failing to break up the special-interest monopoly in Washington, D.C., he has invited the special interests into the White House and asked them for guidance on how to deepen and perpetuate their monopoly,” Weissman said.
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