Adidas is withdrawing its challenge to a Black Lives Matter trademark application featuring three parallel stripes, two days after it contested the image with the U.S. Trademark Office.
Adidas submitted a notice of opposition with the office Monday, saying in the filing that it took issue with Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation's application to trademark the use of three parallel yellow stripes on various items such as clothing and bags.
The company said that it felt that if Black Lives Matter was allowed to use the stripes, it would be “confusingly similar” to its usage of a three-stripe mark, something it had been using on its own merchandise since at least 1952.
By Wednesday, Adidas said it had changed its mind.
“Adidas will withdraw its opposition to the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation’s trademark application as soon as possible,” the German athletic gear company said in a prepared statement.
It did not provide any further details as to why it was withdrawing the application.
Adidas has vociferously protected its triple-stripe trademark for years. In January fashion designer Thom Browne emerged from a New York courthouse victorious over Adidas in a battle over signature stripes. In that case, Adidas had similarly argued that the striped designs used by Thom Browne Inc. were too similar to its own three stripes. The Manhattan federal court jury sided with Browne.
A legislative package to end the government shutdown appears on track. A handful of Senate Democrats joined with Republicans to advance the bill after what's become a deepening disruption of federal programs and services. But hurdles remain. Senators are hopeful they can pass the package as soon as Monday and send it to the House. What’s in and out of the bipartisan deal has drawn criticism and leaves few senators fully satisfied. The legislation includes funding for SNAP food aid and other programs while ensuring backpay for furloughed federal workers. But it fails to fund expiring health care subsidies Democrats have been fighting for, pushing that debate off for a vote next month.
Sabrina Siddiqui, National Politics Reporter at The Wall Street Journal, joins to break down the SNAP funding delays and the human cost of the ongoing shutdown.
Arguments at the Supreme Court have concluded for the day as the justices consider President Donald Trump's sweeping unilateral tariffs in a trillion-dollar test of executive power.
President Donald Trump said he has decided to lower his combined tariff rates on imports of Chinese goods to 47% after talks with Chinese leader Xi Jinping on curbing fentanyl trafficking.
The Federal Reserve cut its key interest rate Wednesday for a second time this year as it seeks to shore up economic growth and hiring even as inflation stays elevated. The move comes amid a fraught time for the central bank, with hiring sluggish and yet inflation stuck above the Fed’s 2% target. Compounding its challenges, the central bank is navigating without much of the economic data it typically relies on from the government. The Fed has signaled it may reduce its key rate again in December but the data drought raises the uncertainty around its next moves. Fed Chair Jerome Powell told reporters that there were “strongly differing views” at the central bank's policy meeting about to proceed going forward.
