http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/report-dozens-of-trump-products-made-overseas/article/2585268Report: Dozens of Trump products made overseasBy GABBY MORRONGIELLO (@GABRIELLAHOPE_) • 3/8/16 6:21 PM
Donald Trump has been offshoring the production of Trump-brand products since 2006, despite his unrelenting criticism of companies that send jobs overseas, according to a new report.
The report comes less than a week after Trump was caught defending outsourcing as "not always a terrible thing" and sometimes "a necessary step" in a 2005 blog post unearthed by Buzzfeed News.
Trump-brand products have been outsourced to China, Japan, Honduras and Brazil as well as European countries Norway, Italy and Germany since 2006, according to data collected by ImportGenius, a company that gathers information related to exports and imports. The data was compiled into a public spreadsheet by Our Principles PAC, a group committed to ending Trump's candidacy. The data also shows that about 1,200 shipments of Trump-brand goods have come to the U.S. from foreign companies and manufacturers since 2011.
Everything from slippers and men's shirts to ballpoint pens and "Trump body soap" has come to the U.S. from Asian and South American countries, the data shows. Trump has previously admitted that clothes such as ties, which belong to his menswear line, are manufactured in China and Mexico.
"This man made nothing in America," former Jeb Bush staffer and Our Principles PAC spokesman Tim Miller said in an email to the Washington Examiner.
"Trump has made an entire career and fortune out of taking advantage of the American worker to enrich himself. There is no reason to believe his rhetoric now. All you have to do is look at his Chinese product labels to know what Donald values most — himself," Miller added.
Trump, who has chastised companies such as Nabisco, Ford and Boeing for outsourcing jobs to China and Mexico, has said that "laborers are paid a lot less, and the standards are worse when it comes to the environment and health care and worker safety" in countries where manufacturing is being moved to. Still, that hasn't stopped the New York billionaire or his family from mass-producing a portion of their products overseas.
The spreadsheet, first reported by Yahoo Politics, shows that dozens of shipments of Ivanka Trump footwear have come from Hong Kong since she debuted her footwear line in March 2011. Other foreign shipments include Ivanka Trump jewelry and an Ivanka Trump earring box.
Trump has repeatedly pledged to "bring jobs back to America" in his stump speech and during debates, and the White House hopeful suggested imposing a 45 percent tariff on Chinese imports during an interview with the New York Times earlier this year.
Several of Trump's opponents and critics have pointed to outsourcing as an instance where his actions don't match his rhetoric.
"How do you reconcile a business model based on importing with professions of deep belief that manufacturing should be brought back to America?" Robert Lawrence, a professor of trade and investment at Harvard University, wrote Tuesday in a column for PBS. "Trump argues he has no choice, since foreigners have made their products so cheap by manipulating their exchange rates. But then how do you explain the utter contempt he has expressed on the campaign trail about others who outsource when he is doing exactly the same thing?
"If Trump won't buy Oreos on moral grounds, why should any moral person, following his example, buy Trump-branded merchandise?" Lawrence asked.
A spokeswoman for Trump's campaign could not be reached for comment.
