China grants preliminary approval to 38 new Trump trademarks

>"The latest registrations are a natural result of those longstanding, diligent efforts and any suggestion to the contrary demonstrates a complete disregard of the facts as well as a lack of understanding of international trademark law," he said in an email.

>China's State Administration for Industry and Commerce, which oversees the Trademark Office, did not immediately respond to a request for comment Wednesday.

>Dan Plane, a director at Simone IP Services, a Hong Kong intellectual property consultancy, said he had never seen so many applications approved so expeditiously.

>Plane said he would be "very, very surprised" if officials from the ruling Communist Party were not monitoring Trump's intellectual property interests. "This is just way over your average trademark examiner's pay grade," he said.

>The marks include branded spa and massage services, golf clubs, hotels, insurance, finance and real estate companies, restaurants, bars, and a trademark class that covers bodyguards, social escorts, and concierge services.

>It's not clear whether any Trump-branded businesses will materialize in China. Garten did not elaborate on how the trademarks would be used, but said the company did not apply for a trademark for social escort services.

>Garten said in an email to the AP that part of the application included concierge and security related services associated with the operation of a hotel or restaurant, but not "escort services," a legal trademark classification.

>Those hotel-related services fall into the same trademark class as escort services, which were included in the Chinese government's preliminary approval of the mark. The filing lists "escort service," ''body guard," and "social escort," among others.

>Many companies register trademarks in China only to prevent others from using their name inappropriately.

>Janet Satterthwaite, a global trademark attorney and partner at Potomac Law Group in Washington, says nothing about Trump seeking and receiving trademarks in China raises any immediate red flags.

>"Especially in China, you absolutely need to register defensively so that people do not exploit your name for commercial gain," she said. She that that while the marks are moving faster than in her own experience, "it does not look like China did anything extraordinary here."

>Spring Chang, a founding partner at Chang Tsi & Partners, a Beijing law firm that has represented the Trump Organization, declined to comment specifically on Trump's trademarks. But she said she advises clients to take out marks defensively, even in categories or subcategories of goods and services they may not aim to develop.

>"I don't see any special treatment to the cases of my clients so far," she added. "I think they're very fair and the examination standard is very equal for every applicant."

>But ethics experts — and Democrats — say a government's discretion to approve trademarks could turn into an opportunity to exercise leverage over the U.S. president.

>Richard Painter, who served as chief ethics lawyer for President George W. Bush, said the volume of new approvals raised red flags.

>"A routine trademark, patent or copyright from a foreign government is likely not an unconstitutional emolument, but with so many trademarks being granted over such a short time period, the question arises as to whether there is an accommodation in at least some of them," he said.

>Painter and Norman Eisen, who served as chief White House ethics lawyer for President Barack Obama, are involved in a lawsuit alleging that Trump's foreign business ties violate the U.S. Constitution. Trump has dismissed the lawsuit as "totally without merit."

Who cares?

Trump deserves this after all the shit Demoncrats have been putting him through.

>Three of the new China trademarks are for Scion, a hotel brand Trump's sons are looking to expand in the U.S. Unlike almost all of Trump's China trademarks, they are registered in the name of a Delaware company called DTTM Operations LLC, rather than Donald J. Trump himself. The Trump Organization has transferred ownership of dozens of trademarks from the president to DTTM Operations LLC since its incorporation in January 2016.

>Trump has said he assigned all his business interests to a trust overseen by one of his sons, Donald Trump Jr., and a longtime Trump Organization executive, Allen Weisselberg. However, Trump retains the ability to revoke the trust at any time and as the sole beneficiary stands to benefit financially from it.

>Democratic Sen. Ben Cardin of Maryland said the Chinese trademarks stand as a prime example of how Trump's refusal to divest from his businesses as previous presidents have done raises ethical questions.

>"They're trying to curry favor with the president," he said.

___

>Associated Press researcher Fu Ting in Shanghai and reporters Kelvin Chan in Hong Kong, Randall Chase in Delaware and Andrew Taylor, Chad Day and Julie Bykowicz in Washington contributed to this report.

>>120012
>Who cares?
I cares; he's working on my dollar.

>Trump deserves this after all the shit Demoncrats have been putting him through.
No, he doesn't deserve to take advantage of his office to sell out to foreign interests for his own sake while trying to distract us like we're retards.

Of course, you're right that this shouldn't matter, since he's an illegitimate president since he should have been impeached after he refused to divest from his businesses, so that someone who could do his job more effectively (literally anyone) would take office. But republicans in congress are too chicken shit to stand by their principles, so it does matter.

>>120015
>No, he doesn't deserve to take advantage of his office to sell out to foreign interests for his own sake while trying to distract us like we're retards.
Your choice of words is pretty ironic considering American presidents do exactly that. I'm sure all the support Israel gets from every single American president is fine so long as its a Democrat president?

>>120017

The Democrats have aired toward whatever was in the interest of a stable middle east, so they've been willing to support all peaceful parties therein.

Democrats support Israel. At the same time, Democrats abstained from UNSC resolution against Israel's hardliners supporting settlement construction while the Republicans have guaranteed Israel's government their support at all costs. Even when that government harms the prospects for long-term peace between Israel and Arabs.

>>120017

Well I'm not a democrat, but I'm unbiased enough to admit you'd be hard pressed to find any president (democrat or republican) in our history that has flouted all standards with respect to avoiding conflicts of interest as Trump and his administration, and generally disrespecting he office we've trusted him with, and he's barely been president for two months.