Disney, Wal-Mart CEOs picked to advise Trump administration

A cadre of Wall Street leaders and corporate CEOs will be regularly advising the Trump Administration through a “Strategic and Policy Forum,” the transition announced Friday.

The forum will be led by Stephen A. Schwarzman, the CEO of Blackstone, and include J.P. Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon, BlackRock CEO Larry Fink, General Motors CEO Mary Barra, Walt Disney CEO Bob Iger, Wal-Mart CEO Doug McMillon and 10 other members.

“Members of the Forum will be charged with providing their individual views to the President – informed by their unique vantage points in the private sector – on how government policy impacts economic growth, job creation, and productivity,” the transition said in a statement. “The Forum is designed to provide direct input to the President from many of the best and brightest in the business world in a frank, non-bureaucratic, and non-partisan manner.”

The group represents another striking example of the way Trump’s populist campaign rhetoric — embodied in the oft-chanted phrase “drain the swamp” — has collided with a transition that is producing an administration stocked with the same economic elite Trump accused of hurting the American economy.

“This forum brings together CEOs and business leaders who know what it takes to create jobs and drive economic growth,” Trump said in a statement on the forum. “My administration is committed to drawing on private sector expertise and cutting the government red tape that is holding back our businesses from hiring, innovating, and expanding right here in America.”

The forum is similar in some ways to President Barack Obama’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness, which was chaired by General Electric CEO Jeffrey Immelt.

The group will hold its first meeting in early February at the White House.

A full list of forum members was provided by the transition:





Stephen A. Schwarzman (Forum Chairman), Chairman, CEO, and Co-Founder of Blackstone;



Chairman, CEO, and Co-Founder of Blackstone; Paul Atkins, CEO, Patomak Global Partners, LLC, Former Commissioner of the Securities and Exchange Commission;



CEO, Patomak Global Partners, LLC, Former Commissioner of the Securities and Exchange Commission; Mary Barra, Chairman and CEO, General Motors;



Chairman and CEO, General Motors; Toby Cosgrove, CEO, Cleveland Clinic;



CEO, Cleveland Clinic; Jamie Dimon, Chairman and CEO, JPMorgan Chase & Co;



Chairman and CEO, JPMorgan Chase & Co; Larry Fink, Chairman and CEO, BlackRock;



Chairman and CEO, BlackRock; Bob Iger, Chairman and CEO, The Walt Disney Company;



Chairman and CEO, The Walt Disney Company; Rich Lesser, President and CEO, Boston Consulting Group;



President and CEO, Boston Consulting Group; Doug McMillon, President and CEO, Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.;



President and CEO, Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.; Jim McNerney, Former Chairman, President, and CEO, Boeing;



Former Chairman, President, and CEO, Boeing; Adebayo “Bayo” Ogunlesi, Chairman and Managing Partner, Global Infrastructure Partners;



Chairman and Managing Partner, Global Infrastructure Partners; Ginni Rometty, Chairman, President, and CEO, IBM;



Chairman, President, and CEO, IBM; Kevin Warsh, Shepard Family Distinguished Visiting Fellow in Economics, Hoover Institute, Former Member of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System;



Shepard Family Distinguished Visiting Fellow in Economics, Hoover Institute, Former Member of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System; Mark Weinberger, Global Chairman and CEO, EY;



Global Chairman and CEO, EY; Jack Welch, Former Chairman and CEO, General Electric;



Former Chairman and CEO, General Electric; Daniel Yergin, Pulitzer Prize-winner, Vice Chairman of IHS Markit