Merck’s CEO, first of three chiefs to quit Trump’s council of business leaders

After the Charlottesville protests over the weekend, during which one woman was killed and several others injured, three business leaders have quit Trump’s council as a result of him not taking a harder stance on the issue.

Merck’s CEO, Ken Frazier, was the first to announce his resignation from the council, taking to Twitter with an official statement:

Merck have stated that they have no further comment on Frazier’s statement, according to a report by FiercePharma.

Frazier has been joined by the chief executives of Intel, Brian Krzanich, and Under Armour, Kevin Plank, whose announcements came just hours after.

The criticism of the president arose after his statement, which was considered to be not strong enough, regarding the deadly incident in Virginia where a car drove into a crowd of people who were protesting a white supremacist rally. In the wake the resignations, Trump has further spoken about the incident to toughen up his stance.

These latest three executives add to the list of those that have already left Trump’s councils earlier this year due to various policies being implemented by the president.