The Trump Princelings Are Basking In The Swamp

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FRED WERTHEIMER’S WEEKLY NOTE | MAY 31, 2018freadshot

“If they actually want to avoid conflicts, Ivanka Trump and her husband and West Wing colleague Jared Kushner must either fully divest their business enterprises or leave their White House jobs.”

Last week, Norm Eisen and I published a piece titled “Trump has given us the ultimate Chinese import: American princelings” at Yahoo News, discussing how the President, his children, and his son-in-law are taking advantage of the presidency to enrich themselves.

The examples are numerous – Donald Trump Jr. promoting luxury apartments in India, Jared Kushner’s family company pursuing deals with Qatari government-linked financiers, Ivanka Trump’s brand applying for trademarks in China.

Let’s look at just one case:

On May 11, a Chinese state-owned construction company announced that it would make a loan of $500 million to finance a project that includes a Trump-branded hotel, residences, and a golf course. On May 13, two days later, Trump tweeted that he wants to help Chinese telecom firm ZTE “get back into business” after it was hit by U.S. sanctions in April. The move stunned Trump advisers and congressional Republicans.

Also in May, according to The New York Times, the Chinese government approved seven Ivanka Trump trademarks, bringing her brand’s Chinese trademark total to 34.

On May 25, the President announced that he would allow ZTE to “reopen.” A few days later, Ivanka Trump abruptly left a conference call when she was questioned about her brand’s Chinese trademarks.

At minimum, this entire series of events creates the appearance of a conflict of interest.

Is it truly just coincidence, or are we seeing the exchange of U.S. policy for financial benefits? The American people have no way of knowing.

What we do know is this: if they actually want to avoid conflicts, Ivanka Trump and her husband and West Wing colleague Jared Kushner must either fully divest their business enterprises or leave their White House jobs.

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Fred Wertheimer is the Founder and President of Democracy 21, a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that works to strengthen our democracy and ensure the integrity and fairness of government decisions and elections.