Tesla CEO Elon Musk says on Friday he and other members of the Trump administration’s business advisory council will share their objections to the president’s immigration order that led Uber CEO Travis Kalanick to drop out of the group.
“In tomorrow’s meeting, I and others will express our objections to the recent executive order on immigration and offer suggestions for changes to the policy,” Musk said in a statement Thursday evening.
The President’s Strategic and Policy Forum, comprised of some of America’s leading business leaders, was created in early December to advise Trump and help him put together his economic agenda.
Both Musk and Kalanick were added to the group later in the month, rounding it out at 19 members, which includes executives from the Walt Disney Company, PepsiCo and General Motors.
But Kalanick, according to a memo made public Thursday, said he could no longer participate in the economic council because “the group was not meant to be an endorsement of the president or his agenda but unfortunately it has been misinterpreted to be exactly that.”
Trump’s executive order last Friday, which temporarily bans on immigrants from seven majority-Muslim countries, has been met with fierce resistance by Democrats and large protests nationwide. Even some Republicans have expressed dissatisfaction with the ban.
Musk, in his statement, took a slightly different point of view from that of Kalanick, saying that “[a]dvisory councils simply provide advice and attending does not mean that I agree with actions by the Administration.”
“My goals are to accelerate the world’s transition to sustainable energy and to help make humanity a multi-planet civilization, a consequence of which will be the creation of hundreds of thousands of jobs and a more inspiring future for all,” Musk said.
“I understand the perspective of those who object to my attending this meeting, but I believe at this time that engaging on critical issues will on balance serve the greater good.”
