Alex
Gorsky (L) of Johnston & Johnson and Michael Dell of Dell
Technologies, Andrew Liveris of Dow Chemical and White House
Senior Advisor Jared Kushner visit before a meeting with U.S.
President Donald Trump in the Roosevelt Room at the White House
January 23, 2017 in Washington, DC. Business leaders who attend
the meeting included Elon Musk of SpaceX, Mark Sutton of
International Paper, Mario Longhi of US Steel, Marillyn Hewson of
Lockheed Martin, Wendell Weeks of Corning, Mark Fields of Ford
Motor Company and others.
Getty
Images
President Donald Trump planned to meet on Monday at the White House with leaders of construction and sheet metal unions, two sources with knowledge of the meetings told Reuters.
Sean McGarvey, president of the North America's Building Trades Unions, Terry O'Sullivan, president of the Laborers' International Union of North America (LIUNA) and Joseph Sellers, president of SMART, a sheet metal union, were among those who planned to attend, the sources said on condition of anonymity.
The union meeting follows a gathering of 12 chief executives of large companies at the White House to discuss revitalizing the U.S. manufacturing economy.
Earlier this month, Trump held separate meetings with Teamsters President Jim Hoffa and AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka in New York.
On Monday, Trump signed an order to withdraw from the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement, a deal that was harshly criticized by organized labor.
Not all major unions were invited to Monday's event. A spokesman for the United Steelworkers union, Wayne Ranick, said the union was not invited.
"We are always interested in such discussions given that 100,000s of our members work in manufacturing and (are) affected by trade," he said in an email.
President Donald
Trump.
Chip Somodevilla/Getty
Images
Trump sparred with a local steelworkers union president Chuck Jones in December over the number of jobs United Technologies Corp agreed to save at a Carrier plant in Indiana.
Nearly all major unions endorsed Trump's rival, Hillary Clinton, during the presidential election campaign.
During the campaign, Trump appealed to blue collar workers in Midwestern states vowing to bring jobs back from Mexico, which helped him win crucial states like Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania.
A CNN exit poll said Trump carried 42 percent of voters in union households compared with 51 percent for Clinton. He did far better among union members than Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney did in 2012.
Read the original article on Reuters. Copyright 2017. Follow Reuters on Twitter.