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Tuesday, November 10, 2026Nov 10

Cooper’s eye on the left: Ex-Obama staffer decries policies

General Electric Co. CEO Jeffrey R. Immelt, center, is no longer singing the same tune he once did as the head of President Obama's Council on Jobs and Competitiveness.
General Electric Co. CEO Jeffrey R. Immelt, center, is no longer singing the same tune he once did as the head of President Obama's Council on Jobs and Competitiveness. General Electric Co. CEO Jeffrey R. Immelt, center, is no longer singing the same tune he once did as the head of President Obama's Council on Jobs and Competitiveness.

No longer drinking the Kool-Aid

The man who once headed President Obama’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness issued a letter to his General Electric stockholders recently, accusing the president’s policies of failing to create jobs and destroying the competitiveness that American companies need to succeed in the global market.

Government policies, CEO Jeffrey Immelt said, are perpetuating “slow growth, poor job creation, populism, low productivity, higher regulation, poor policy and more slow growth.”

Fortunately, he said, GE is making decisions that may not be right in the partisan political world but are necessary in the competitive marketplace.

“It doesn’t do any good to win awards for good governance if you are getting eaten alive by competitors,” Immelt wrote. “Our sole truth of performance is in the market, winning with customers and investors.”