Trump Will Bring Eight Cabinet Members to Davos Forum This Month
President Donald Trump plans to bring a big delegation with him to the small Swiss ski town of Davos in two weeks.
(Bloomberg) -- President Donald Trump plans to bring a big delegation with him to the small Swiss ski town of Davos in two weeks, including eight Cabinet members and some of the White House’s senior staff.
Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin, who will lead the administration’s economic delegation, on Thursday brushed aside portraits of the annual forum as a gathering of elite proponents of globalization, a characterization previously made some former Trump advisers.
“I don’t think it’s a hangout for globalists,” Mnuchin said at the White House daily press briefing.
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross and U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer will be part of the delegation, the White House announced. Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, Energy Secretary Rick Perry, Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao and Labor Secretary Alex Acosta will also attend.
The president’s son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner, National Economic Council director Gary Cohn, chief of staff John Kelly and National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster also will attend the World Economic Forum the week of Jan. 22 as part of the delegation.
Trump’s administration is embracing Davos this year after previously spurning the gathering of the world’s economic elite. His former chief strategist, Steve Bannon, has derided people who attend the conference as the “party of Davos,” describing them as anathema to the nationalist, populist voters who put Trump in the White House. Last year, before he was inaugurated, none of Trump’s aides or Cabinet nominees attended the conference.
Mnuchin said Trump and his advisers will use the event to talk about Trump’s “America First” agenda, adding than an “economy that’s good for the U.S. is good for the rest of the world.”
To contact the reporter on this story: Jennifer Jacobs in Washington at jjacobs68@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Alex Wayne at awayne3@bloomberg.net, Mike Dorning, Joshua Gallu
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