Despite a bitter Twitter reaction from President Donald Trump after Nordstrom dropped First Daughter Ivanka Trump’s fashion line, sinking retailer Sears also joined a rash of sellers ditching the Trump merchandise. (Sears and Kmart, which it owns, carried Ivanka merch only online.) Some retail watchers are wondering why President Trump hasn’t lashed out at Sears also — they reportedly dropped 31 items from the Trump Home collection. The answer may be in Trump’s new Treasury Secretary, Steven T. Mnuchin, who was a large investor in Sears.
The Senate this week confirmed former Goldman Sachs banker Mnuchin as Treasury secretary in a 53-to-47 vote. Until December Mnuchin served on the board of directors of Sears Holdings (and everybody better hope the Treasury fares better than Sears). Mnuchin was roommates at Yale with Sears’ private equity billionaire owner Edward Lampert and enjoyed a long prosperous relationship with Lampert after college. So Trump has a reason not to pile on with Sears. Trump has no comparable relationship with management at Nordstrom.
