His move followed public criticism of an online auction that the Eric Trump Foundation had sponsored offering a chance to have coffee with his sister Ivanka. The criticism intensified over the weekend after an invitation was drafted offering a hunting trip with Eric Trump or his brother Donald Jr. in exchange for donations of $500,000 or $1 million to a new charity that friends of Eric Trump had created this month with his apparent consent, according to legal documents.
Ethics experts had begun to compare Eric Trump’s charitable campaigns to efforts by the Clinton Foundation, which was a relentless target of criticism by President-elect Donald J. Trump during his campaign. Mr. Trump argued that Hillary Clinton had provided favors to donors while she served as secretary of state, an accusation she called baseless. The president-elect has also faced calls from ethics experts to separate himself from his business empire.
Associates of Eric Trump said he had made the decision not to solicit contributions with deep regret. He has been raising money for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in Tennessee since he was 21, helping deliver, he said, more than $15 million to the institution, which offers free care to needy children. (Tax records filed by his foundation show a total of at least $6.5 million between 2008 and 2014, although additional contributions by affiliated groups might bring that total higher, and the records do not show money given since)
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