I Understand That Puppeteers Are and Considered Actors, but What About Animators?

I feel there is a bit of overlap between animators and puppeteers. Both portray how a character connects and looks to the audience without necessarily giving an actual voice to the character they are "performing" (for lack of a better word".

I can understand animators not being counted since they don't always directly animate the characters on screen, but what about character animators? Animators that were hired and paid for specifically animating the movements of the characters and especially their facial expressions. For example, Glen Keane was a character animator for Ariel in The Little Mermaid (1989). Character animators are a bit of a thing of the past since most modern animated movies do not hire specific character animators but it was a big thing for animated movies decades ago.

Do animators count as actors? Or just character animators?