GOYA FOODS:
Goya Foods, a Hispanic-owned brand in the U.S. that was the source of providing Latin cuisine, was found by a Spanish-American, Don Prudencio Unanue and his wife Carolina in 1936. They started the company ‘Goya Foods’, as a small convenience store at the beginning on Duane Street in Lower Manhattan, when they migrated to Puerto Rico from Spain.
ROBERT UNANUE, THE CEO OF GOYA FOODS PRAISES TRUMP AT AN EVENT:
The CEO of the company attended an event that took place in the White House, on Thursday. This event was solely arranged to take some steps for the betterment of the Hispanic community, which will make them financially more stable and give them a better education system.
At this event, President Trump alongside the guest of honor, Robert Unanue signed a contract that was to make the Hispanic community strong, wealthy, and successful.
At the event, the CEO of Goya Foods, Robert Unanue gave a speech after the successful deal in which he praised President Trump.
He stated, “We are all truly blessed at the same time to have a leader like President Trump, who is a Builder”.
https://www.instagram.com/p/CCrAzKiBFUQ/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link
Consumers boycott the brand:
The loyal consumers who had been buying products of this brand for years found the CEO’s statement very biased and decided to boycott the brand. On the other hand, many high-profile figures are also demanding a ban on the company’s products.
IVANKA TRUMP SUPPORTS AND PROMOTES ‘GOYA FOODS’:
If it’s Goya, it has to be good.
Si es Goya, tiene que ser bueno. pic.twitter.com/9tjVrfmo9z— Ivanka Trump (@IvankaTrump) July 15, 2020
On Tuesday night, Trump’s daughter and White House advisor Ivanka Trump posted a picture of her holding a can of Goya food’s ‘black beans’ alongside a caption, “If it’s Goya, it has to be good”.
By supporting the company openly she breached the government ethics rule which left a lot of people in anger.
Ivanka deliberately made this post as a response to people who boycotted the brand and to show her support in front of social media and some Hispanic leaders who became very angry when the company’s CEO, Robert Unanue praised Trump blindly in a Rose Garden event last week.
In a Friday interview, Unanue made it clear one more time that he is not going to apologize for what he said and will say it again because everybody has their own opinions on different matters and they have the complete right to say anything they want to.
TRUMP’S EFFORTS TO PROMOTE THE BRAND:
Later on, Trump posted a picture of him smiling with his thumbs up, alongside a number of Goya products like black beans, coconut milk, seasoning, and chocolate wafers, to show his strong support for the brand and its CEO, Unanue.
President’s tweet:
Trump also posted a tweet in support of Goya foods. In his tweet he quoted, ‘Doing Great!’, he further stated, “The Radical Left smear machine backfired. People are buying like crazy!”
He tweeted in support of Unanue, as the world’s largest Hispanic company was losing a lot of its loyal consumers drastically after Unanue’s statement in an event that was in turn affecting the business.
STATEMENT OF ‘THE UNITED STATES OFFICE OF ETHICS’:
The United States Office of Ethics which works at ‘preventing conflicts of interest in the executive branch’, has a number of rules and regulations for the executive branch employees working as Government Officials.
According to the guidelines, the employees cannot use their power or position to promote brands, service, business, or a person for a matter of fact, or speak in their support directly as it may sound controversial.
Trump and Ivanka, breached and violated all the rules and guidelines by openly promoting and supporting the Hispanic brand, Goya foods on their Instagram and Twitter accounts.
President Trump’s spokeswoman made a statement in support of both Trump and Ivanka saying that, ‘They are showing their personal support for the brand by promoting it and there is nothing wrong in it’.
She further quoted, ‘Ivanka has every right to say whatever she wants to and she’s proud of supporting the largest Hispanic brand, Goya food’.
WALTER SHAUB, THE FORMER DIRECTOR OF OFFICE OF GOVERNMENT ETHICS, SAID:
The former director clearly stated that the tweet is a violation of all the guidelines. The director further says that although Trump’s accounts show that they are personal pages, it is still unacceptable to post something like this on your social media being a public figure as it clearly violates the rules that have been set from the very beginning.
He further added that due to the ongoing conflict between the company’s CEO and loyal consumers, the President shouldn’t have spoken in favor of the company as people were already angry.
According to the guidelines, one who violates these rules can end up getting fired, fined, or demoted. But the problem here still stays because it is very unlikely that Trump will face any of these consequences. And Trump, for a fact wouldn’t let his daughter go through this as he himself posted in the favor of the company and violated all the rules.
CHIEF ETHICS COUNSEL FOR ‘CREW’, VIRGINIA CANTER TOLD:
Canter said that it is completely allowed for them to charge someone on such posts. She further said that if they receive complaints on posts like these, they can count them as a violation of rules.
Shaub furthermore stated that despite having ethical training and knowing about it way better, Ivanka still made a post supporting the brand, which can make it seem like the brand is personally being supported and sold.
The campaign was solely carried out in order to help out the Americans that are unemployed at the moment but due to its specific name, it was highly criticized by the people. Due to the ongoing pandemic, many Americans were facing the problem of unemployment regardless of their cast or ethnicity but this campaign specifically pointed towards the Hispanic community that became a topic of debate and raged the community. The CEO’s support for Trump made them even angrier and they ended up boycotting his brand.
