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Trump hawks L.L.Bean products because heiress is a political supporter of his

With just 8 days until he enters the White House, Donald Trump continued his Twitter controversy marathon on Thursday by trying to put the presidential seal of approval on a private company – L.L.Bean. Trump tweeted his thanks to the heiress of the company’s founder for her support. In his tweet Trump said that people should “Buy L.L.Bean.”

Here is the full tweet:

 

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Trump told his Twitter followers to buy stuff from L.L.Bean because the retailer’s founder’s granddaughter, Linda Bean has been a supporter of Donald Trump’s. In fact, according to Politico, “she illegally donated to a PAC supporting Trump, leading to calls for a boycott. (Her $60,000 donation exceeded the amount that the PAC could accept from any one contributor.)”

Why Trump’s L.L.Bean tweet would break White House ethics rules

But here is the problem with what Trump did, if he does the same thing in just 8 days when he is the president it will break an important ethics rule. And that is because the Office of Government Ethics prohibits executive officials from using their position of power to endorse an organization, product or person. And while this regulation technically does not apply to the president, President Barack Obama put in place a White House policy that expanded it to also apply to the Oval Office.

According a Politico piece which was the first to report on the potential breach of protocol. Norm Eisen, Obama’s former ethics czar, “We strictly forbade this when I was in the White House for the President and everyone else. How can you ask others to follow it if he doesn’t?”

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