The Trump administration this month honored U.S. companies as part of “Made in America” week—but one key component was decidedly un-American.
President Donald Trump used Shopify, a Canadian e-commerce company founded by Germans, to sell “proudly made in USA” products on his website, the Daily Dot discovered.
Shopify is headquartered in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, and was founded, in part, by German-born Tobias Lütke and Daniel Weinand in 2004. Lütke is also Shopify’s CEO. The company processed purchases from100 million shoppers in 2016, according to Fortune.
The source code for shop.donaldjtrump.com reveals that Trump’s official online store is using Shopify’s service. According to the Wayback Machine, Trump began using Shopify on Aug. 26, 2016, after migrating from a different, seemingly native, e-commerce service.
President Trump sells a vast array of products on his official store, shop.donaldjtrump.com, including golf club covers, beer can coolers, Trump-Pence megaphones, baby one-pieces, and of course, “Make America Great Again” hats.
This revelation is merely the latest example of how Trump does not practice what he preaches. On Thursday, BuzzFeed reported that Trump’s private club in Palm Beach, Florida, Mar-A-Lago, asked the Department of Labor for permission to hire 70 temporary foreign workers under the government’s H-2B visa program and that the Trump National Golf Club in Jupiter asked to hire six more foreign cooks.
As part of “Made in America” week, the White House invited U.S. companies from across the country for a “Made in America Product Showcase.” The White House praised the companies for producing their products within the borders of the United States; products that ranged from beer, to yachts, to NASA space suits.
In a statement, the White House claimed that “for too long our government has forgotten American workers,” and pledged: “Under the leadership of President Trump, not only will the American worker never be forgotten, but they will be championed.”
In April, Trump signed an executive order called “Buy American and Hire American.” The order stated: “It shall be the policy of the executive branch to buy American and hire American.”
Neither the White House nor DonaldJTrump.com immediately responded to requests for comment via email on Friday.
Shopify offers several packages, ranging from $9 per month for a service that allows customers to sell products on Facebook, to $299 per month for an advanced package. It is unclear which package is used to sell products on shop.donaldjtrump.com. Shopify did not reply to an email from the Daily Dot on Friday about the services it provides to Trump. A telephone call to Shopify went straight to voicemail.
