Donald Trump’s two eldest sons, Don Jr. and Eric Trump, will manage his real estate and resort businesses while he’s in office, the president-elect announced late Monday. And he pledged that “no new deals will be done” during that time.
In a series of tweets posted around midnight, Trump stressed that while he is “not mandated by law” to step down from the management of his companies as president, he would do so in order to “focus full-time on the presidency.”
The tweets are the latest chapter in the ongoing saga of the president-elect and his companies, more than 500 individual corporations that collectively make up the Trump Organization. His businesses operate in dozens of different industries and all around the world, creating an unprecedented potential for conflicts of interest to occur while he is president of the United States.
So far, neither Trump nor his transition team has explained what he means by “no new deals.” Nor did the businessman indicate whether he has any plans to sell his overseas holdings before taking office.
The fact that he did not mention Ivanka Trump, his eldest daughter, suggests that she will take a leave of absence from the company, as has been previously reported. She and her husband, Jared Kushner, may also be preparing to assume positions in Trump’s administration, according to political observers.
But like many of Trump’s tweets, the Monday statement did not address many of the biggest questions surrounding his businesses, and the ethical quagmire in which they land him.
A few minutes after tweeting about his companies, Trump wrote that he would hold another press conference “soon” to answer these questions. But it has now been over a month since Trump was elected and he has yet to hold a full press conference.
The promise of a new press conference comes after Trump had previously announced that he would hold a press briefing on Dec. 15 and reveal his plan for addressing potential conflicts of interest. Transition officials said Monday, however, that the briefing had been postponed and it would be rescheduled for sometime in January. They did not announce a new date.
“With so many iconic properties and successful entities, moving the announcement to January ensures the legal team has ample time to ensure the proper protocols are put in place so his sole focus will remain on the country and achieving his ambitious agenda,” wrote Sean Spicer, a Republican National Committee spokesman in an email Monday to The Washington Post.
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