STEPHEN MOORE: When it comes to this economic council, look, the CEOs have to do what's in the best interest of their companies and follow their own conscience. I had warned the White House that the first time there was any controversy, that these CEOs, who most of them were not for Trump in the first place, would probably abandon him. I predicted this kind of thing would happen, and so it's not surprising to me that you're seeing a lot of these folks leave this council. In the meetings that I was in when Trump would have these council meetings, by the way, they really, truly were listening, towards where Donald Trump would sit around the table and listen to these CEOs and ask them, “what do you need from the federal government, how do you want it to work better, how can we in the federal government help you create jobs”. That's what it was all about and it's a shame that this council now has to be, I believe, Brooke, it's being disbanded. 



RANA FROROOHAR: Brooke, I got jump in here and say I spoke to many people this morning in the C-suite and the reports that I got were that many of these meetings didn't go well at all and there have been concerns even since the Paris Accord, frankly, amongst a lot of these CEOs, a lot of internal hand-wringing about whether they should be involved with the White House or not. They told me the meetings had not been going well. The proper officials from various federal departments weren't even in attendance and I think that this really marks a tipping point and I think this is a huge deal for the Trump administration and the White House. If you think about it, Brooke, for starters, the strategic committee had already decided to disband before President Trump tweeted that this morning, following a conference call that was led by Steve Schwarzman, the CEO of Blackstone. When you think about the business community losing faith in the White House and also labor, you know, Richard Trumka, the head of the AFL-CIO had already resigned. That's two core groups, that's the business community and working class white men and I think this is a real blow for the White House. 



MOORE: Well, but wait a minute. You just -- hold on. I just want to respond to that. You said that a lot of these CEOs basically decided they didn't want to be part of this when Trump pulled out of -- 



FOROOHAR: There had been hand-wringing since the Paris Accord. 



MOORE: Let me make a point about this. A lot of these CEOs, basically said they didn't want to be a part of this because Trump wanted to drop out of the Paris Accord but guess what? Donald Trump said he was going to do that during the campaign so if they didn't want to be part of a council with somebody who is going to pull us out the Paris Accord, then why did they join the council in the first place? 



FOROOHAR: You know what, they joined it for two reasons because they believed that you should join a council when your president asks you to but also later on because they wanted to keep some adults in the room around important policy conversations like tax reform, infrastructure, health care. None of that stuff has gotten done.



MOORE: When he did what he said he was going to do -- when he said he was going to do what he was going to do, then why did they say,  “I'm so outraged by this.” They knew his positions when they took these positions. Now, look -- 



FOROOHAR: These folks--many of these folks have been trying to influence the president and the White House around things like the skills agenda, around infrastructure, now I'm not saying that many of them possibly shouldn't have taken a stand and stood down earlier but I think let's not fool ourselves. The entire business community has been worried about the Trump agenda for some time, and this -- the disaster that is his handling of Charlottesville is just the apex of that. 



MOORE: Okay, but let me make a point. What is business really, mostly concerned about? What are CEOs concerned about? About a healthy economy. My goodness. Has any president in the first six months delivered a healthier economy than Donald Trump. 



FOROOHAR: Stephen, don't even get me started on this-- 



MOORE: You're seeing a boom in jobs. You're seeing a pickup in optimism. You're seeing a pickup in employment. I made this point yesterday on CNN, it's worth repeating, that for all the talk about how Donald Trump has an anti-black agenda, this is a president who's created black jobs just in the first six months in office at twice the pace that Barack Obama did. 



FOROOHAR: I'm sorry. God bless you but we've been through this before. We've fact checked the fact that Donald Trump does not deserve credit for anything good that has happened in the American economy in the last six months. 

Previously:

Trump’s remarks defending neo-Nazis were full of right-wing media talking points

CNN's Jake Tapper blasts Trump for again equating neo-Nazi violence with anti-racist demonstrators 

CNN's Symone Sanders calls for Trump to fire “white supremacist sympathizers” Steve Bannon and Sebastian Gorka