WASHINGTON -- President Donald Trump summoned some of America's most prominent corporate executives to the White House on Thursday and told them that he intends to put them to work restoring manufacturing jobs and U.S. dominance in trade.
"They share our commitment to bring manufacturing back and to create jobs in this country," Trump said as he sat with the 24 business leaders, who included Andrew Liveris of Dow Chemical Co., Jeffrey Immelt of General Electric Co., Marillyn Hewson of Lockheed Martin Corp. and Doug Oberhelman of Caterpillar Inc.
Trump used the public portion of the meeting to reiterate some of his campaign themes, blasting what he called "unbelievably bad" trade deals and singling out trade deficits with Mexico and China. He vowed to punish companies that move jobs outside the U.S. and promised to squeeze more money out of government contracts, citing his talks with Hewson, which he said cut the cost of Lockheed's F-35 fighter jet by more than $700 million.
"She's tough, but it worked out well, I think, for everybody," Trump said of Hewson.
[PRESIDENT TRUMP: Timeline, appointments, executive orders + guide to actions in first 100 days]
Before meeting with Trump, the executives split into working groups to explore policy changes on topics such as taxes and trade, regulation, infrastructure and the future workforce. Joining them in the breakout sessions were administration officials, including Vice President Mike Pence, Gary Cohn, director of the National Economic Council, Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin, and senior adviser Jared Kushner, who is also Trump's son-in-law.
Campbell Soup Co. Chief Executive Officer Denise Morrison and Harris Corp. CEO Bill Brown were among those who took part in the working group sessions with administration officials, who also included budget Director Mick Mulvaney. Another discussion group included Corning Inc. CEO Wendell Weeks, and their conversation touched on transportation and gasoline taxes.
In a meeting with Cohn and Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao, business leaders including Weeks and Nucor Corp. President John Ferriola discussed gasoline taxes in relation to solving some of the country's transportation needs.
Thursday's meeting grew out of Trump's December announcement of an advisory panel on manufacturing. The panel has met at least once already, three days after Trump took office in January.
Trump has used previous meetings with companies to encourage corporate leaders to build their products in the U.S., offering tax breaks and lower regulation to bring down costs -- and warning that he wants to raise tariffs on products made overseas. The heads of labor organizations, automotive companies, national retail chains, drug companies, and airlines are all among the groups who have met with Trump in the West Wing in recent weeks.
"As you can tell by the structure of the meeting, the president is expecting these interactions to lead to real action being taken by the administration," White House spokesman Sean Spicer said.
Information for this article was contributed by Ben Brody, Michelle Cortez and Margaret Talev of Bloomberg News.
A Section on 02/24/2017