The Trump Organization may sell its Washington hotel

President Trump's hotel in Washington, D.C. may soon be up for sale.

The Trump Organization is looking into selling the rights to its Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C., having hired a real-estate firm to market it, The Wall Street Journal reported Friday.

"People are objecting to us making so much money on the hotel, and therefore we may be willing to sell," Eric Trump told the Journal. The president has faced criticism, and lawsuits, from those who argue that profiting off of the hotel where foreign officials can stay is a violation of the Constitution's emoluments clause. Trump recently referred to the the emoluments clause as "phony" in reference to a scrapped plan to hold next year's Group of Seven summit at one of his properties.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

The Trump Organization is seeking more than $500 million for the lease rights, the Journal reports. The federal government leases the building to the company.

The New York Times and The Washington Post both also reported on the news Friday, with the Times noting that the D.C. hotel since opening in 2016 "quickly became one of the single biggest sources of revenue for the Trump family" and is "one of the few parts of the company that has seen major revenue growth" during Trump's presidency.