Ivanka's show of support for working women falls short

With two young children, Deng Guilian hadn’t planned on going back to work. That changed after her husband was arrested while investigating labor abuses at Chinese suppliers for Ivanka Trump’s brand.

Now the 36-year-old mom works the overnight shift at a karaoke parlor and stays in a dorm nearby. She gets just three days off a month to see her kids.

[...]

Days she spends in a dormitory, where she and a co-worker share a bed with a Snoopy headboard. Room and board are free, but she makes less than 2000 yuan ($316) a month.

[...]

In May, Deng’s husband, Hua Haifeng, and two of his colleagues were accused of illegally using secret recording devices and thrown in jail while investigating factories that made shoes for Ivanka Trump’s brand. The group they were working for, a New York non-profit called China Labor Watch, obtained evidence of forced overtime and pay as low as $1 an hour, as well as a video of a manager berating a worker for apparently arranging shoes in the wrong order.

“If I see them f---ing messed up again,” the manager yells, “I’ll beat you right here.” Another worker was left with blood dripping from his head after a manager hit him with the sharp end of a high heeled shoe , according to three eyewitnesses who spoke to the AP.

[...]

The investigators were released after 30 days, but the bail conditions — restrictions on travel, regular meetings with the police — have made it hard for Hua to find work.

Hua was ordered not to speak to the media and declined to comment for this story.

[...]

The family worries Hua could get plucked up by police any day and vanish from their lives again.

[...]

Trump’s brand and spokesman declined to comment for this story, but in her 2017 best-seller, “Women Who Work,” Trump spoke about her commitment to improving “the lives of countless women and girls” and acknowledged that her father’s presidential campaign gave her “an unprecedented opportunity to advocate for change.”

[...]

[Trump's daughter] Arabella and her two little brothers are her “greatest passion,” Ivanka Trump wrote. “I’m the first person they see in the morning, and the last to give kisses at night.”

  AP

Perhaps she could try to do something for this woman so her kids can see her every morning, too.