China moves quickly to grant Trump a trademark he’s been seeking for a decade.
Trump fought unsuccessfully in Chinese courts for years to try to gain control of the trademark, but his fortunes changed suddenly last year during the latter stages of his campaign for the White House.
China’s trademark review board announced in September it had invalidated a rival claim for the Trump trademark, clearing the way for Trump to move in. In November, soon after the election, it awarded the trademark to the Trump Organization. The trademark was officially registered this week after a three-month notice period for objections expired.
The sequence of events makes some ethics experts uncomfortable: Chinese authorities reversed their position as Trump’s political star rose.
“China is going to want concessions from Mr. Trump, and this is now the first in what will be a series of efforts to influence him,” said Norman Eisen, a White House ethics counsel under President Obama. Eisen is part of a group that has sued Trump for violating the foreign emoluments clause of the Constitution by accepting foreign payments through his business ventures.
But Trump Organization attorneys told CNN that it was simply trying to protect the Trump trademark from someone who had been improperly squatting on it, and that any accusation that President Trump could be compromised by the trademark decision granted by the Chinese government is completely baseless and shows a disregard for the facts.
It is difficult to assess the value of the new trademark. It covers construction-related services, not for Trump’s core hospitality and real-estate businesses.
But even if construction-related services are not a core business for the Trump Organization, the company places a great value on anything with the Trump brand.
“The Trump brand is key to the value of the Trump Organization’s assets,” Sheri Dillon, a Trump lawyer, said last month.
Trump can also argue that he’s a lot more famous in China now than he was when he first started the trademark battle there in 2006, giving him a stronger claim to the Trump name.
