CEO of pharmaceutical giant Merck: George Floyd ‘could be me’

The CEO of pharmaceutical giant Merck on Monday said he watched the videotape of George Floyd being killed by a white officer with the knowledge that it “could be me.” “What the African American community sees in that videotape is that this African American man, who could be me or any other African American man, …

The CEO of pharmaceutical giant Merck on Monday said he watched the videotape of George Floyd being killed by a white officer with the knowledge that it “could be me.”

“What the African American community sees in that videotape is that this African American man, who could be me or any other African American man, is being treated as less than human,” Frazier, who is black, said on CNBC’s “Squawk Box.”

“What the community saw was, until they went out into the streets, this officer — much less even the other officers — was not even going to be arrested for what was clearly inhumane treatment of a citizen,” he added.

The 65 year-old Frazier, who became the first African American to lead a pharmaceutical giant when he took over at the $200 billion company in 2011, said in the interview that the business community can be a “unifying force” to help quell social unrest by creating more jobs and opportunities.

“Joblessness leads to hopelessness,” Frazier said. “Hopelessness leads to what we see in the streets.”

Frazier previously made headlines in 2017 when he resigned from a manufacturing advisory council to the Trump administration in the fallout of the Charlottesville protests, citing “a responsibility to take a stand against intolerance and extremism.”

His decision led the president to lash out on twitter against the head of the nation’s third-largest pharmaceutical company.

“Now that Ken Frazier of Merck Pharma has resigned from President’s Manufacturing Council, he will have more time to LOEWR RIPOFF DRUG PRICES,” Trump tweeted.

Shares of Merck were down 1 percent Monday morning, at $79.91.

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