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Note -- I did my absolute best to refer to the Trump organization as "Trump organization" and president Trump only as "President" or "Administration" to avoid confusion as they are understood (At least, when you give them the benefit of the doubt) to be separate entities.

It was reported by the AP that China granted the Trump organization 38 trademarks that it's been doing ten years of legal proceedings to acquire. I'm going to give the current administration the benefit of the doubt and assume that this grant of trademarks was an attempt to curry favor with the Administration without being directly requested by the president or any of his subordinates. I am assuming based on the fact that the Trump Organization had so much trouble getting these trademarks through until the President had taken office and the large number was approved nearly simultaneously indicates foul play and an attempt to curry favor on the part of the Chinese government.

Assuming this is the case -- How can the current administration have any positive interaction that does not give the appearance of being based on a conflict of interest? Giving Concessions to China without (universally understood) equal benefit to the United States would have the appearance of giving way to conflict of interest, how can proper relations possibly continue?

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    There is no law against the appearance of conflict of interest. For POTUS, there is no legal conflict of interest. I think this is really a political question, since in fact there is no legal issue.
    – user6726
    Mar 8, 2017 at 18:41
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    The legal issue arises under the Emoluments clause of the U.S. Constitution. People who aren't legal specialists often describe this as a conflicts of interest law, which isn't quite correct but captures the spirit of it. washingtonpost.com/politics/…
    – ohwilleke ♦
    Mar 9, 2017 at 8:09
  • @user6726 While the standard conflict of interest statute does not apply to POTUS, the Emoluments Clause applies only to POTUS. And the violation thereof is pretty blatant.
    – Andrew Lazarus
    Oct 24, 2019 at 21:07

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"How can it?" Complete divestiture of businesses and all assets placed in a blind (not "run by my kids") trust.

That's why this is often (really, almost always) done, and why people have been calling for Trump to do it.

If it's "How can it, in the current status quo?" It can't. It's rife with actual conflicts of interest, inadvertent conflicts, and even more appearances of conflicts of interest.

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  • Does 'blind' mean that all the publicly visible assets of the Trump Organisation, including buildings and trademarks would have to be sold, with the trust keeping the details of what they bought in exchange secret?
    – bdsl
    Jul 16, 2017 at 14:07
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    @bdsl - I'm not a legal expert, but to be "blind," yes, Trump should not be able to know what business assets he owns, so in the case of branded holdings, they should be sold.
    – PoloHoleSet
    Jul 17, 2017 at 14:14

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