The President’s daughter

With Ivanka Trump’s brand witnessing a spurt in sales, questions about whether her business interests are in direct conflict with her new role as advisor to father and US President Donald Trump refuse to die

WHO DO you represent?” moderator Miriam Meckel, editor-in-chief of the German business weekly Wirtschaftswoche, asked Ivanka Trump at the recent women’s economic empowerment conference in Berlin. “Your father, the American people, or your business?” “Well, certainly not the latter, and I am rather unfamiliar with this role as well, as it is quite new to me,” responded Ivanka to the query, that encapsulated the blurring of lines between her business interests and her new role as advisor to her father, US President Donald Trump.

With Ivanka and husband Jared Kushner assuming prominence in the White House, the Trump administration has been plagued with not only charges of nepotism but also conflict of interest.

Since her father was elected president, notes an Associated Press report, global sales of Ivanka Trump merchandise have surged. “The company has applied for at least nine new trademarks in the Philippines, Puerto Rico, Canada and the US. The commercial engine of the first daughter’s brand is stronger than ever even as she builds a new political career from her West Wing office,” says the report.

But it is another revelation in the piece that underscores how “difficult it is for the president’s daughter to separate business from politics in her new position at the White House”. “On April 6, Ivanka Trump’s company won provisional approval from the Chinese government for three new trademarks, giving it monopoly rights to sell Ivanka brand jewellery, bags and spa services in the world’s second-largest economy. That night, the first daughter and her husband sat next to the president of China and his wife for a steak and Dover sole dinner at Mar-a-lago (Trump’s private resort).”

“Her conduct inside the White House is vexed by the same controversial conflicts of interest plaguing the president himself. And in some ways, she is just as culpable as he in pushing this White House into unprecedented ethical territory,” writes Sarah Posner in The Washington Post, pointing out that the president’s daughter has not fully divested herself from her family business — Ivanka has shifted the brand’s assets to a trust overseen by Josh Kushner, her husband's brother, and his sister Nicole Meyer. She continues to retain a stake in the firm.

Ivanka has asserted that she has “no involvement” in the management of her business. “I felt like proximity to my father and to the White House and — with my husband taking such an influential role in the administration — I didn’t wanna also be running a business. So I put it into trust. I have independent trustees,” she told CBS.

But given the growth of her business, her assertions have done little to change the perception of conflict of interest. “All the Trump family knows is how to make and close business deals... Now that she is serving in the White House in an unprecedented position, Ivanka is benefiting from loose or nonexistent accountability mechanisms. After all, who wouldn’t want to do business with the President of the United States’s daughter, especially one who holds an office in the West Wing,” writes Anushay Hossain on CNN.

Many, including Caroline Leaper of the British daily The Telegraph, wonder how “despite a turbulent last year in the press and a boycott from consumers”, Ivanka’s fashion label posted a 61 per cent increase in wholesale revenues. “This performance contrasts dramatically with statements released by department stores such as Nordstrom, one of many big names to drop Ms Trump’s products, citing weak sales,” writes Leaper.

Some attribute the spurt in sales to the fact that even before she took charge as advisor to the President, Ivanka was frequently wearing and promoting her own products via presidential platforms. Elizabeth Segran refers to her appearance on 60 Minutes last November, after which many reporters received an email from the vice-president of sales at Ivanka Trump Fine Jewelry. “Journalistsreceivedastylealert email... which highlighted that she had worn a $10,000 bangle from her collection during her father’s first interview as president-elect. It said, ‘Please share this with your clients’,” Segran writes in the US business magazine Fast Company. In February this year, Counselor to US president Kellyanne Conway infamously made a pitch for Ivanka’s brand in an interview with Fox News: “This is just a wonderful line. I own some of it... I’m going to just give it a free commercial here: Go buy it today, everybody. You can find it online.” Josh Voorhees of the Slate, ascribes the increase in sales to the “media frenzy” around incidents such as Conway’s “infomercial”. “As frustrating as it might be to see the Trumps benefit from such a brazen stunt, it shouldn’t come as much of a surprise. Given the relatively small market penetration of the Ivanka brand, Conway’s ‘free commercial’ for it... always seemed more likely to attract the attention of new customers than to turn off existing ones. The Trumps aren’t actually the business experts they play on TV, but it’s clear they understand that, more often than not, there really is no such thing as bad press.” In the past too, the issue of conflict of interest has been raised with US presidents who owned a considerable amount of financial assets. But to put such concerns to rest, all of them before Trump, starting with Lyndon Johnson, voluntarily placed their assets in blind trusts — a trust independently administering the business interests of a person in public office to prevent conflict of interest. “This meant that investments were managed by an independent entity, without the beneficiary knowing what they were... The decisions by the president and his daughter not to create truly blind trusts mean that concern over potential conflicts of interest will persist... Simply asking the American people to trust the president, his three eldest children and his son-in-law to do the right thing may not be satisfactory for many Americans,” writes Beth A Rosenson in The Conversation. Jenniferrubinof The Washington Post feels it is time the Republicans did some “soul-searching and decide whether they want to defend a morals-deficient White House or fulfill their constitutional obligations”. “History will not treat them kindly if they continue turning a blind eye on conflicts, allowing the Trump family to shred the ethics architecture that administrations of both parties have built,” she writes. CURATED BY ANKITA DWIVEDI JOHRI