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US President Donald Trump (AP photo)
TOI Correspondent from Washington: Growing allegations that the Trump household is drunk with powerfulness took a caller precocious this week pursuing a Forbes study that US subject stores are present selling Trump-branded wines.The contention erupted aft the mag reported that Trump-labelled wines and ciders had appeared connected shelves of work escaped stores for subject unit successful Washington DC and Centreville, Virginia up of the vacation season. Administration officials confirmed the income but maintained it did not interruption immoderate laws. Trump surrogates insisted the products, similar galore different Trump branded goods, were portion of a licensing arrangement, and the President’ had nary relation successful the same.
However, watchdog groups decried the income arsenic a blatant monetization of national facilities, adjacent if nary nonstop ineligible usurpation could beryllium proven. "This is 1 of those things wherever determination astir apt isn’t immoderate ineligible issue, but determination is an optics and an morals issue," said Jordan Libowitz spokesperson for Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics successful Washington (CREW), adding that if the authorities buys the products wholesale, it could interruption the Constitution's Emoluments Clause, barring presidents from other benefits beyond salary.
The incidental though fits a broader signifier of the Trump family's alleged self-enrichment, including forays into crypto ventures that critics accidental has derailed US-India ties. In aboriginal 2025, World Liberty Financial (WLF)—a decentralized concern level majority-owned by the Trump household (including Donald Trump arsenic "Chief Crypto Advocate" and sons Eric and Donald Jr. successful enactment roles, with a reported 60% stake)—signed a high-profile Letter of Intent with Pakistan's recently formed Crypto Council (PCC).
The deal, which immoderate observers accidental whitethorn person emboldened the Pakistani heavy authorities to propulsion disconnected the Pahalgam violent onslaught connected April 26, was led by WLF co-founder Zachary Witkoff, lad of Trump's longtime state and diplomatic troubleshooter Steve Witkoff. The concern has fueled accusations of conflicts of interest, with critics similar erstwhile US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan suggesting it whitethorn person prompted Trump’s kid-glove attraction of Pakistan and prioritizing it implicit India.
In a September 2025 Meidastouch podcast, Sullivan stated Trump "threw the India narration implicit the side" owed to Pakistan's concern overtures, undermining decades of US-India alignment connected technology, economics, and countering China.
There person been much dodgy developments since. Binance laminitis Changpeng Zhao, who had advised Pakistan’s Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb connected positioning the state arsenic a crypto hub, won a afloat and unconditional pardon from Trump precocious past period aft helium had pled blameworthy successful November 2023 to violating US anti-money laundering laws and served a four-month situation sentence.
Trump aboriginal told CBS 60 minutes helium did not cognize who Zhao was adjacent though helium issued him a pardon.
The Trump dispensation’s lavish pursuits, including the gathering of a White House shot country and a "Great Gatsby"-themed Halloween gala helium threw past week astatine Mar-a-Lago, implicit with flapper dancers, feather-adorned guests, and champagne toasts, each evocative ofF. Scott Fitzgerald's communicative of excess and inequality, person drawn crisp rebukes for insensitivity, coming peculiarly during a authorities shutdown.
“Nothing says ‘I consciousness your pain’ similar champagne flutes and flapper girls portion kids spell hungry. Happy Halloween from Count Dracula of Empathy,” the late-night big Stephen Colbert remarked, portion others invoked Marie Antoinette and Caligula.
