10/21/20
The closing arguments of the 2020 campaign can be summed up as: Donald Trump wants to talk about Joe Biden’s family, while Joe Biden wants to talk about your family, and how to help it get through these times. But where is the discussion and investigation into the various conflicts of interest and possible illegality that involves Donald Trump’s daughter, Ivanka, who appears to have greatly profited from being a part of this White House? And these aren’t new allegations raised to be a political counterbalance to the recent ones against Hunter Biden. Rather, as documented by the non-partisan watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics (CREW), Ivanka’s unethical conduct dates back to early 2017 and ranges from her receiving trademarks from the Chinese government while her father was in talks with the Chinese president to a complaint filed by CREW in January 2019 with the Department of Justice to assess if Ivanka and husband Jared Kushner violated federal law by profiting from a tax program they had championed. If Hunter Biden had received a lucrative deal from a foreign country on the very same day his then-vice president father was meeting with the leader of that foreign country, Trump—and many in the media—would be calling that out as sleazy and possibly illegal. But Ivanka Trump has done that and worse and we don’t hear a peep.
For example, in April 2017, on the very same day Trump dined with Chinese President Xi Jinping, the Chinese government granted preliminary approval for Ivanka’s long-sought-after trademarks for her namesake fashion brand. Another jaw-dropping example of possible blatant corruption, as CREW detailed, came when Ivanka received preliminary approval for additional trademarks from China’s government on June 7, 2018. What else happened on June 7, 2018? Her father agreed to lift sanctions against the massive Chinese telecommunication company ZTE, which is partly owned by the Chinese government. The Trumps aren’t even trying to hide the conflicts! One of the most serious allegations flagged by CREW was in January 2019 when the organization filed a complaint was Ivanka and her husband’s personal involvement in the Trump administration’s implementation of a new tax law authorizing “Opportunity Zones” that would provide tax breaks to owners of certain types of real estate holdings. As CREW explained, Ivanka worked on this program while being aware that “her husband, Jared Kushner, held financial interests worth millions of dollars in an entity benefitting from that program.” These allegations demand a full investigation to determine Ivanka and her father’s possible role in these sweetheart deals. Despite what Donald and Ivanka may believe, just because your last name is Trump does not mean you are above the law.
