President Donald Trump met Thursday with CEOs of 24 manufacturing companies that he praised for being committed to “bringing manufacturing back.”
The corporations also are some of the most politically active in Washington.
They spent $250 million combined in 2015 and 2016 on lobbying, according to a review by CNN. Their political action committees gave more than $13 million in campaign contributions to federal candidates in those two years, CNN found.
And they had a valuable day in Washington on Thursday.
Before the White House meeting with Trump, the CEOs discussed policy in a next-door office building with Vice President Mike Pence, senior adviser Jared Kushner, chief economic adviser Gary Cohn and the secretaries of treasury, transportation as well as other top administration officials.
“This is a classic example of the type of influence that big money buys,” said Craig Holman of Public Citizen, which advocates against money in politics. “This is the type of swamp that I think a lot of Trump supporters wanted to see drained.”
The CEOs spent the pre-White House meeting discussing issues that have been the subject of extensive lobbying in recent years, including spending on infrastructure, easing federal regulations to help businesses and taxation policy.
“They actually sat down with Trump and talked policy with him one-on-one,” Holman said.
Big spenders
The CEOs represented some of the nation’s largest employers, such as Dow Chemical, General Electric, Lockheed Martin, Ford, Merck, 3M and Archer Daniels Midland.
Those also are some of the biggest spenders on lobbying, records show.
The 24 companies represented at the White House spent a total of $250 million lobbying Congress and federal agencies in 2015 and 2016, according to a CNN review of federal lobbying-disclosure reports.
That’s 4% of all money spent on Washington lobbying in those years.
The companies’ political action committees gave $13.5 million in political contributions, with almost all of the money going to congressional candidates, according to a records kept by the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan research group that tracks money in politics. The PACs gave no money to Trump and just two donations, worth $11,000 combined, to Hillary Clinton.
Advocates said the absence of contributions to Trump is not surprising because he was widely expected to lose the election — and also not significant because of the amount of money given to congressional campaigns.
“As long as the money is going to their (political) team, they’re going to take the phone calls and make the meetings and give the access to the special interests,” said Paul S. Ryan of Common Cause, which advocates against the influence of money in politics. “Political players here in Washington, including the President and members of Congress, what gets their attention is generous spending and contributions by special interests.”
The White House, asked for comment, said in an email: “Only CNN would try to cast aspersions on this tremendous day focused on bringing American manufacturing jobs back to US soil. These are some of the largest employers in the country and hearing their ideas on creating jobs is essential to strengthening our economy.”
“Bringing manufacturing back to America”
The National Association of Manufacturers also celebrated Thursday’s events.
“It is encouraging to have an administration that will take the time to sit down with manufacturers and hear what we have to say,” association board chairman David Farr wrote in blog post. “Manufacturers have the solutions. We just need our leaders to get the work done.”
The campaign contributions went heavily toward Republican candidates, who received 66% of the $13.5 million. That tilt is found throughout the manufacturing sector, records from the Center for Responsive Politics show.
The CEOs themselves gave 79% of their $426,000 in contributions to Republican candidates and organization. But couple of the CEOs leaned Democratic: Andrew Liveris of Dow Chemical gave $35,000 to the Democratic National Committee and Wendell Weeks of Corning gave $5,400 — the maximum contribution allowed in a two-year span for federal canidates — to Clinton.
Trump has met with numerous CEOs since taking office as he has made jobs and growth a centerpiece of his presidency. On Thursday, he said, “Bringing manufacturing back to America, creating high-wage jobs was one of our campaign promises and themes, and it resonated with everybody.”
Ian Vandewalker of the Brennan Center for Justice, which advocates against the influence of money in politics, said it’s common for presidents to give access to companies that spend heavily on politics.
“There’s nothing wrong with the president meeting with heads of major industries. But we see over and over again this pattern of the people who spend a lot of money in lobbying (that is) connected to and amplified by campaign contributions are the people in the room when decisions get made.”