A clothing and accessories boutique in San Francisco has filed a class action lawsuit against Ivanka Trump’s brand, alleging that the business has an unfair advantage over competitors now that President Donald Trump is in office.
Lawyers for the Modern Appeal Clothing alleged in the complaint, filed last week in Superior Court in California, that once Trump took office, competition between the boutique and Ivanka Trump’s brand began to favor Ivanka Trump. It’s similar to an unfair competition claim filed earlier this month by a bar and restaurant in Washington, D.C. Cork Wine Bar alleged in its suit that Trump International Hotel in D.C. has an unfair advantage over other restaurants in the District due to Trump’s presidency.
The complaint from Modern Appeal Clothing noted that the brand’s sales have surged recently. Abigail Klem, president of the Ivanka Trump brand, said that sales increased in February, and analytics from Slice Intelligence also showed the brand’s performance increase. The brand’s sales through Amazon were up 332 percent in January and February, per Slice’s analytics, while sales at Macy’s increased 148 percent and ticked up 29.5 percent at Bloomingdale’s.
The complaint also highlights several instances of the President and his associates promoting Ivanka Trump’s line. The President published a tweet criticizing Nordstrom after that retailer announced it would no longer carry Ivanka Trump’s line, and White House counselor Kellyanne Conway subsequently promoted Ivanka Trump’s brand on television. The brand itself has used Ivanka Trump’s appearances with her father in interviews or at political events to market pieces from the fashion line.
Modern Appeal Clothing is not seeking monetary damages in the suit. Instead, it asks the court to order Ivanka Trump’s brand to “discontinue their unfair competition.”
A representative for Ivanka Trump’s brand declined to comment on the lawsuit to TPM.
Ivanka Trump is set to start working out of an office in the White House as an unofficial, unpaid adviser to her father. The President has also reportedly asked for a security clearance and government-issued devices for his daughter.
Ivanka Trump’s lawyer, Jamie Gorelick, acknowledged to Politico that the President’s daughter has not entirely eliminated her conflicts of interest by stepping away from her leadership role in the company and putting her interests in a trust. Gorelick said that Trump had tried to minimize those conflicts and would voluntarily comply with White House ethics rules.
“The one thing I would like to be clear on: we don’t believe it eliminates conflicts in every way,” Gorelick told Politico. “She has the conflicts that derive from the ownership of this brand. We’re trying to minimize those to the extent possible.”
This post has been updated.
I keep thinking Republicans ignore this Emoluments Clause at their own peril. But time will tell…
I can’t wait until we Democrats get the majority in either house or both and have subpoena power. These people will be held to account…and that’s not a threat…that’s a fucking promise. There will be an end to this kind of corruption, and flouting the law as if that’s normal, or Democrats shouldn’t bother running for office if they won’t commit to making sure that happens.
Break the law, pay the price. You do the crime, then do the time. I’m so sick of this shit.
This really is so unbelievable; how the Trump cabal is normalizing criminality and totally unethical behavior. The world is watching, and so is every US politician who has ever dreamed of being more corrupt than he/she already is. Trump’s brazen acts and conflicts are so overwhelming that it’s almost the same phenomenon as the banks being “too big to jail”. Trump is a tsunami of corruption and what’s clearly obvious is, he should be impeached, convicted and sent to jail. In today’s Congress, that’s laughable. If Democrats point out Trump’s crimes, it’ll simply be shrugged off by the GOP as “partisan politics”. This is so depressing.
I’d like to believe that but why do you believe it would be true?
AFAICR Dems have generally been spineless my entire adult life. Recall they let the 22 million deleted Bush e-mails go as well as a host of other Bush II era crimes.
Are there any Democrats who will be as aggressive (with the truth) as any Republican? Hillz got close but was walking a fine line IMHO due to all the crud thrown at her.
Another problem is that the vandals do so much damage that once the adults get back in charge they’re too busy trying to clean up the mess to pursue justice.