White House attorney reached out to ethics watchdog amid Conway-Nordstrom fallout: report

President Trump’s ethics attorney spoke with the top lawyer at the Office of Government Ethics in the days following the controversial White House responses to Nordstrom’s decision to drop Ivanka Trump’s clothing line, NBC News reported Friday.

Shortly after Nordstrom announced its stores would no longer carry the first daughter’s merchandise due to dwindling sales, Trump bashed the decision as “terrible” and claimed that the department store giant was treating his daughter “unfairly.”

That led top OGE attorney David Apol to email deputy White House counsel Stefan Passantino hours later, asking to speak on the phone about “the President’s tweet concerning the decision of Nordstrom to stop carrying his daughter’s line of products,” according to emails obtained by NBC News.

{mosads}Passantino promptly called Apol, and Apol recommended that Trump abide by a typical — though not legally binding — standard of conduct that prohibits the president from using his office for personal gain.

The next day, White House counselor Kellyanne Conway made headlines after she promoted Ivanka Trump’s fashion line during an interview on “Fox & Friends.”

“Go buy Ivanka’s stuff is what I would say,” she said. “I’m going to give a free commercial here: Go buy it today, everybody. You can find it online.”

The comment sparked immediate backlash, including calls from top House Oversight Committee members, for the OGE to recommend discipline for Conway, which it did. It also prompted Passantino to call Apol again, this time to tell the OGE that he would “be taking appropriate action to address her conduct.”

On Thursday, the OGE sent the White House a letter expressing disapproval with its decision not to discipline Conway for her “free commercial.”