“My daughter Ivanka has been treated so unfairly by @Nordstrom. She is a great person -- always pushing me to do the right thing! Terrible!” Trump tweeted. | AP Photo Trump blasts Nordstrom for dropping Ivanka’s clothing line Obama's former ethics czar calls the tweet 'outrageous.'

President Donald Trump on Wednesday blasted luxury department store Nordstrom for dropping the label of his daughter Ivanka Trump, a move that drew immediate criticism for further blurring the line between Trump’s administration and his family’s businesses.

“My daughter Ivanka has been treated so unfairly by @Nordstrom. She is a great person -- always pushing me to do the right thing! Terrible!” Trump tweeted Wednesday morning.


Trump's team also retweeted his tweet on his official @POTUS account, which reaches 15.1 million followers. By comparison, Trump’s @realDonaldTrump account reaches 24.2 million followers.

Nordstrom had announced on Feb. 2 that it would stop carrying Ivanka Trump’s label due to its performance. “We've said all along we make buying decisions based on performance," Nordstrom said in a statement to The Associated Press. "We've got thousands of brands — more than 2,000 offered on the site alone. Reviewing their merit and making edits is part of the regular rhythm of our business."

While Nordstrom contends the decision was solely a business one, the publicly traded company has delved into the Trump administration’s controversial actions.

Nordstrom had issued an internal statement in support of immigrants following Trump’s executive order temporarily barring immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries just three days before dropping Ivanka Trump’s line. The move also comes amid a broader #GrabYourWallet hashtag calling for a boycott of all Trump products.

White House press secretary Sean Spicer defended the president’s tweet during the daily briefing on Wednesday, asserting that Trump should be able to defend his family.

“For people to take out their concerns about his actions or his executive orders on members of his family, he has every right to stand up for his family and applaud their businesses activities, their success,” he said.

Some Trump critics immediately pounced on Trump’s tweet, holding it up as further evidence that Trump is not respecting what should be a firewall between the White House and his sprawling business empire.

Norm Eisen, a former Obama administration ethics czar, called the move “outrageous” on Twitter and said Nordstrom should consider suing under the California Unfair Competition Law, which forbids “any unfair” business act.

Sen. Bob Casey (D-Pa.) also replied to Trump’s tweet, by “cc”ing the Office of Government Ethics.

Casey’s press secretary Jacklin Rhoads said in an emailed statement that the senator “feels it is unethical and inappropriate for the President to lash out at a private company for refusing to enrich his family.”

Richard Painter, the former chief ethics lawyer in the Bush administration, weighed in, too, saying the tweet was “absolutely unacceptable.”

“This is misuse of public office for private gains,” he said. “And it is abuse of power because the official message is clear — Nordstrom is persona non grata with the Administration.”

Even during matters that directly affect the administration, such as the banking crisis, presidents generally avoid mentioning particular companies by name, Painter said. Any time Nordstrom gets a decision it doesn’t like from the federal government, Painter said, there will be a question of whether political appointees were involved and if there was a link to the White House.

“Nordstrom will have a due process argument and possibly even a claim when there is any adverse action by the executive branch against it, perhaps a right to discovery as to whether political appointees embarked on a vendetta,” he said. “This creates a potential litigation mess for the federal government.”

Executive branch employees are forbidden from using their positions to promote any corporation, although the president is technically exempt. There does not appear to be an applicable rule that addresses the president impugning a company.

Trump has maintained there are no conflict of interest laws that relate to him, and that may be true in this case, said Scott Amey, the general counsel for the Project on Government Oversight, a nonpartisan independent watchdog organization.

“There are certain regulations on the books for ethical standards for executive officials… but it seems like those regulations exempt the president and vice president,” he said.

However, Amey said the tweet should raise questions within the administration on whether similar statements are appropriate and if they honor the president’s word that he would isolate himself from the family business.

“It does cause me to scratch my head because it doesn’t seem like an appropriate statement for the president of the United States to make,” he said. “To debate these things publicly doesn’t seem to be an appropriate way for the president to spend his time.”

Trump had pledged to fully step away from his private businesses, but he later said he will not sell the companies nor will he place his assets in a blind trust while serving as president. Instead, Trump has said his company will not enter into new foreign deals and will appoint an ethics adviser who must approve any new domestic deals in writing.

Trump’s conflicts of interest will lead to continued lawsuits throughout his time in office unless he more clearly separates himself from his businesses, Amey said.

“He’s going to have to answer to a lot more litigation moving forward, which isn’t in the best interest of the American public and isn’t in the best interests of President Trump.”

Richard Briffault, a professor at Columbia Law School and an expert on government ethics, said the president was violating general ethical principles with his Nordstrom tweet, even if he may not be breaking any specific law.

“I don't know if it violates any specific rule, but it certainly violates the ethical principle that public officials should not use their offices to provide benefits to their family members,” Briffault said.

Kimberly Kralowec, a California attorney who runs a blog about the California Unfair Competition Law, said it would be a stretch to sue Trump under the law, as Eisen suggested. The law is designed to protect consumers and business competitors from unfair treatment.

“If Trump was tweeting about it every day and tweeting it in California, and Nordstrom showed they lost money or property, they may be able to get an injunction, in theory,” Kralowec said. “I think an isolated tweet would be a tough case.”

Nordstrom would have to show it suffered injury and lost money or property because of the tweet in order to have standing, Kralowec said, and a lawsuit would raise questions of the jurisdiction of a California law relating to a tweet sent in Washington, D.C.

Even if the business was harmed, there would be no funds recoverable from Trump if Nordstrom had suffered a loss of sales, as Trump is not the one who gained that money. Under the UCL, loses need to be traceable to the defendant in order to gain restitution of the funds.

On Wednesday, Nordstrom’s stock took a brief fall following Trump’s tweet, but traders and investors had shrugged off the impact by the afternoon.

The Office of Government Ethics and Nordstrom did not immediately return calls for comment.