He never leaves a penny on the sidewalk
by digby
He's just using the presidency to promote his commercial brand for a family business from which he refuses to divest himself and continues to profit. What could be wrong with that?
President Donald Trump has emblazoned the “Trump” brand name on images of the White House to sell in his Trump Store and at the Trump International Hotel in the capital. The products give the bizarre impression that the White House is a Trump hotel.
Walter Shaub, who was director of the Office of Government Ethics in both the Obama and Trump administrations, sharply criticized the products as the latest move to “monetize the presidency” for private gain.
The hotel, located in a landmark building owned by taxpayers and leased by the Trump Organization, is at the center of a lawsuit arguing that the business violates the Constitutional prohibition against a federal official accepting payments or gifts from states or foreign governments — like those that book rooms and events there.
Shaub and other ethics experts say the hotel is an easy conduit for cash from anyone hoping to curry favor with the president. Now Trump appears to be underscoring the direct link between the hotel and “his” White House.
The Trump Organization last year used golf tee markers emblazoned with the presidential seal, but the seal is legally allowed only for official government business so they were removed.
It wasn’t immediately clear if the latest selling of the White House breached regulations, but Jessica Tillipman, a government ethics expert at George Washington University Law School, told the UK Independent that Trump profiting from his position was “bizarre and wrong.”
Trump, unlike other presidents, has neither divested from his businesses nor put his assets in a blind trust to avoid conflicts of interest.
I'm pretty sure that now that the Mueller report has landed, the entire right wing will insist that it vindicates the president and all oversight must immediately cease. It won't happen, of course. The House Democrats will continue. But Trump and the White House will call any other inquiries just another witch hunt --- a conviction in search of a charge.
Putting so much weight on the Mueller probe was risky. Unless this report is an extremely compelling narrative of Trump's unfitness, a lot of people may just agree that it's time to "move on."
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