Friday, November 18, 2016

This isn’t just a photo of Ivanka Trump. It’s a middle finger to democracy.

https://thinkprogress.org/this-isnt-just-a-photo-of-ivanka-trump-it-s-a-middle-finger-to-democracy-750e91a3c0c#.xx2sp7e3t
"Trump is leveraging his new position as president-elect to empower his business empire — and he’s doing it publicly. We’ve known for some time that Trump didn’t plan to actually resolve the unprecedented conflicts his far-flung business interests presented. Instead of liquidating his assets and placing them in a Qualified Diversified Trust, as President Bush did, or investing in index funds and government bonds, as President Obama did, Trump has done nothing. He’s waved away concerns about conflicts-of-interest, saying that he would just hand over control of his business interests to his children. He called this a “blind trust” but it is actually the opposite. A blind trust is when you liquidate your assets and hand them over to a neutral third party to control. The contents of the trust are unknown to you. Trump knows what his assets are and says he is handing them to his children. Immediately after Trump’s election, he named three of his adult children — Ivanka, Eric, and Donald Jr. — to his transition team. This means the same people running the Trump Organization will also be choosing the top officials in the Trump administration."