image of man and woman wearing apparel from Lions Not Sheep company

Screenshot by means of Lions Not Sheep on Fb.

Lions now Not Sheep, which sells a sequence of T-shirts and different apparel with professional-Trump and conservative messages, agreed to pay a $211,335 positive to the Federal Change Commission after it was busted removing “Made in China” tags and changing them with ones claiming the gadgets had been made within the U.S.

The site and social media for the company embrace a number of patriotic imagery to hawk T-shirts, hats, and other items with a number of messaging, together with portraying former President Donald Trump as a Terminator-like figure and slogans like “GIVE VIOLENCE A CHANCE.”

shirts sold by Lions not sheep company

Screenshot by means of Lions No longer Sheep on Facebook.

An Instagram submit from last month confirmed Lions No longer Sheep owner Sean Whalen sporting a shirt that claims “SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED” as he swings round a bat printed with the company name and wrapped in what looks like barbed wire.

The Utah-based company’s identify, in line with the Deseret Information, is a reference to the phrase “a lion doesn’t lose sleep over the opinion of sheep,” and plenty of of their merchandise promote a pro-Second Modification message, oppose Covid-19 restrictions, and so on. Unsurprisingly, Lions No longer Sheep also sells multiple items with “Let’s Go Brandon” and “FJB” on them, euphemisms for “F*** Joe Biden.”

The typical coloration scheme on a lot of Lion now Not Sheep’s products are a patriotic crimson-white-and-blue, and they’ve been transport a free copy of the U.S. Constitution with every order.

However the “Made in the US” labels had been a fraud, the FTC found, finalizing an order against Lions No longer Sheep and proprietor Whalen for “falsely claiming that its imported attire is Made in USA,” when it was in fact made in China and different countries. In a press unencumber, the FTC announced the $211,335 nice imposed on Whalen and his firm, and summarized the order’s other requirements to “cease making bogus Made in USA claims” and “come clean about overseas production”:

Under the order, Whalen and Lions No longer Sheep must stop claiming that products are made in the United States until they can show that the product’s ultimate assembly or processing—and all significant processing—takes position right here and that all or just about all ingredients or parts of the product are made and sourced here.

Additionally below the order, any certified Made in USA claims should include a transparent and conspicuous disclosure in regards to the extent to which the product incorporates foreign parts, elements or elements, or processing. Eventually, to assert that a product is assembled in the United States, Whalen and Lions Not Sheep should ensure that it is ultimate appreciably reworked in the US, its essential meeting takes situation in the United States, and U.S. assembly operations are significant.

It appears Whalen’s own social media posts helped get his company into sizzling water. The record through the Deseret Information noted that Lions now Not Sheep’s web site had claimed they used “white labeling,” or shopping for raw supplies from overseas nations to assemble them within the U.S., however Whalen himself bragged about ripping out the “made in China” tags:

However in line with the FTC criticism, Whalen posted a video to social media claiming he could “conceal the truth that his shirts are made in China by means of ripping out the foundation tags and replacing them with tags pointing out that the merchandise was made in america.”

The grievance specifies that from May just 10 to Oct. 8, 2020, Whalen eliminated tags that disclosed where the products were made. The company’s shirts had labels that learn “Made in the US,” “Made in America,” “Are your products USA Made?” “a hundred% AMERICAN MADE,” and “BEST (expletive) AMERICAN MADE GEAR ON THE PLANET.”

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