Trump Sons Take Break From Running Family Biz To Schmooze At White House

President Donald Trump speaks in the East Room of the White House in Washington, Tuesday, Jan. 31, 2017, to announce his nomination to the Supreme Court. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)
President Donald Trump speaks in the East Room of the White House in Washington, Tuesday, Jan. 31, 2017, to announce his nomination to the Supreme Court. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)
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The firewall that Donald Trump pledged to establish between his business and his administration as President is already showing some cracks.

Eric and Donald Trump Jr., who took over day-to-day management of the Trump Organization, were present at Tuesday night’s announcement of their father’s Supreme Court nominee, Neil Gorsuch. Reporters snapped photographs of the Trump sons chatting with lawmakers including Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orin Hatch (R-UT).

Their appearance served as a reminder that the dividing line between the Trumps’ political and financial interests is far from clear.

In January, the family announced that Trump would relinquish control of his company to his sons and not “discuss” company matters with them, though he would retain control of his assets. His lawyer, Sheri Dillon, told reporters that the Trump Organization would refrain from referencing the Trump administration in all communications, including social media accounts.

Yet the Trump sons, now the public face of the company, frequently refer to their father’s presidency on their personal social media accounts. Eric Trump has kept his feed more restrained, though he and Donald Jr. both tweeted photos from the Supreme Court announcement.

Donald Trump Jr. has kept up a running commentary on his own account, retweeting articles urging Democrats to confirm Gorsuch and his father’s Cabinet nominees. Twitter users noted that he “liked” a tweet from a conservative radio host that said his father would experience a “tremendous spike in political capital” if it was revealed that the shooter who killed six people at a Quebec City mosque on Sunday was found to be Muslim.

Despite initial false reports that a suspect was “of Moroccan origin,” the shooter was actually a non-Muslim French-Canadian man. The shooter’s Facebook page indicated that he was a fan of Trump and French anti-immigrant presidential candidate Marine Le Pen.

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