An online petition urging Macy's to drop Donald Trump from their ads and his
branded products from their stores had drawn more than 550,000 signatures by
early this morning (November 14th). The "Dump Trump" petition was launched by
attorney Angelo Carusone, who cited Mitt Romney presidential campaign
surrogate Trump's election night Twitter rant after President Obama had
been re-elected in which he called the election a sham and called for a, quote,
"march on Washington." He also pointed to a new Macy's Christmas campaign TV ad
in which Trump doubts that the Kris Kringle character from Miracle on 34th
Street is Santa in an apparent nod to Trump's championing of the debunked
birther conspiracy that Obama wasn't born in the U.S. Carusone, who also cites
what he calls long record of sexist behavior, told ABCNews, "I don't believe
people really care what Trump has to say. This is about Macy's benefiting from
Trump's unacceptable behavior." The website Celebuzz cited an attorney for Trump
as saying, "What I find incredulous is that the creator of the petition is
protecting his First Amendment right to free speech while simultaneously trying
to impede upon Mr. Trump's. It's ironic." Macy's released a statement yesterday
evening that distanced the company from Trump's statements, although without
naming him. It said, "Many of the individuals associated with products sold at
Macy's -- or at any retailer, for that matter -- express personal opinions that
are not related to the merchandise we sell or to the philosophies of our
company."
Here is the ad in question:
