President Donald Trump promoted yet another product this week: "great grass" from the company he said replaced the White House lawn free of charge.
Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office on Monday, Trump praised Scotts Miracle-Gro, a public company based in Ohio that sells lawn and garden products.
Trump said the company would soon be replacing the grass in 700 acres of parks around Washington, DC, with "the best grass you can get."
"They do great grass. What can I tell you? I gotta give them a plug because they did the White House for free," Trump told reporters.
The president said he accepted the offer for Scotts Miracle-Gro to do the White House lawn after a "friend" reached out.
"I said, 'I'll take it. How much?' He said, 'Free,'" Trump said, adding he responded, "I'll take it."
Scotts Miracle-Gro announced in June that it was contributing $1 million to the National Park Service to help restore the White House South Lawn following the UFC fight held for America 250 on June 14, Trump's 80th birthday.
Monday's comments are the latest example of Trump endorsing a company that has done something he wants — a trend that has alarmed ethics watchdogs and experts.
"Favors don't stay favors. Sooner or later, they turn into invoices," said Davina Hurt, director of government ethics at the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics at Santa Clara University. "The only question is whether the public gets to see them."
Scotts Miracle-Gro, which donated $500,000 to a pro-Trump PAC in 2024, and the White House did not respond to requests for comment.
Last year, Trump appeared alongside Teslas at the White House and said he planned to buy one to support Elon Musk, then a close ally working at DOGE. This year, Trump has encouraged the public to buy a Dell computer, including after Michael Dell announced he would fund Trump Accounts for children. Trump also praised Walmart for lowering prices on some products — an initiative he claimed was at the White House request, though the retailer did not confirm that.
Richard Painter, who was the chief ethics lawyer under President George W. Bush, said that while presidents should not be endorsing any private companies, Monday's grass promotion was not surprising.
"In the Bush administration, it would've been a categorical, 'No way. We're not doing that,'" he told Business Insider. "'You don't get to do the White House lawn for free and have us promote your company.'"
Painter said the practice of avoiding endorsing private companies was very strictly enforced under Bush and President Barack Obama, but that the first Trump administration "changed everything."
"We've gone so far in this direction of normalizing this kind of" behavior, Painter said.
Hurt said one problem with Trump's actions is that it can give the appearance that a contractor wasn't chosen on merit, which should be the case to ensure maximum benefit for the American people.
Documentation of a competitive bidding process for government contracts is the "gold standard," she said, adding that its absence can erode public trust in the idea that the government "works for the people and not based on friends or favors."
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Kelsey is a senior reporter for Business Insider, where she covers business and tech news as well as stories about travel, luxury, and consulting.Her feature story "Disaster at 18,200 feet" received awards from the New York Press Club and the North American Travel Journalists Association, as well as honorable mention from the Society of American Travel Writers. It was also included on Longreads' and Pocket's best of 2022 lists. She has also received an American Journalism Online Award for her coverage on missing and murdered Indigenous people in Wyoming.She's appeared on CBS, NPR, NBC, and other outlets to discuss her work. She previously worked on the world news desk at the BBC in London and received a master's in journalism from Northwestern University.She can be reached by email at [email protected] or via the encrypted-messaging app Signal @kelseyv.21.Popular storiesDisaster on Denali: Inside a 1,000-foot fall on America's highest peakThrifting is more popular than ever. It's also never been worse.Rolex wouldn't service the vintage watch my mom inherited. Watchmakers say it happens all the time.A tiny, invasive bug and the climate crisis are changing how guitars are made, and shifting the course of music historyThe tourism free-for-all is overGovernment-run boarding schools were founded to 'civilize' Native Americans. Hundreds of dead children remain buried in the schoolyard graves.Meet the Texas minister who helps fly dozens of women to New Mexico every month to get abortionsPeople are flocking to Colorado for the great outdoors, but the air pollution is so bad, it's forcing many to stay insideInside Kabul: An aid worker reveals the devastating chaos that erupted during the US exit from Afghanistan
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