Trump exempts himself from ethics pledge as watchdogs sound alarms

A bipartisan bill to boost transparency and make sure incoming presidents stick to an ethics plan was so uncontroversial that it passed the Senate by a voice vote in 2020. Donald Trump then signed it into law.

But now, after blowing past deadlines to adhere to the law after winning the White House a second time, Trump appears to have excluded himself from those same ethical guidelines.

Trump missed two months of deadlines before finally signing off on an agreement with President Joe Biden’s administration to begin the presidential transition process this week.

But the agreement does not appear to include the president-elect’s pledge to avoid conflicts of interest while in office, despite requirements under a renewed Presidential Transition Act he signed into law four years earlier.

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Trump’s team is turning down federal funding and office space for his transition team — as well as official government checks and security checks for his staff. The president-elect has rebuffed agreements with the Department of Justice to process security clearances to access classified information during the transition.

“This announcement fails to answer key questions about national security threats and FBI vetting of nominees, and increases concerns about corruption,” said Senator Elizabeth Warren, who co-wrote the Presidential Transition Act.

“There appear to be serious gaps between the Trump transition’s ethics agreement and the letter of the law,” she said. “The reliance on private donors to fund the transition is nothing more than a ploy for well-connected Trump insiders to line their pockets while pretending to save taxpayers money.”

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Trump’s agreement with the Biden administration this week paves the way for Trump’s “landing teams” to begin entering government offices to receive briefings from current staff about the day-to-day operations of hundreds of federal agencies.

The team said it is turning down federal support “consistent with President Trump’s commitment to save taxpayers’ hard-earned money,” his campaign said in a statement.

But accepting the money would have put a $5,000 cap on individual donations to the transition and require the public disclosure of donors.

Trump’s team merely said it would not allow foreign contributions and would be disclosing its donors, but did not reveal any guidelines for those pledges.

By turning down roughly $7 million in federal funding for the transition process, Trump will be able to raise unlimited private donations for the transition.

The team “will operate as a self-sufficient organization,” and its “organizational autonomy means a streamlined process,” Trump’s campaign said in a statement.

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Democrats and government watchdogs have been repeatedly sounding the alarms over a lack of clear, transparent ethical guidelines and background checks in place.

The Presidential Transition Enhancement Act, which Trump signed into law in March 20202, requires presidential candidates to “create and release an ethics plan for their transition team prior to the election,” according to the nonprofit, nonpartisan Center for Presidential Transition.

That plan must disclose conflicts of interest for the president-elect and transition team members, as well as a code of ethical conduct that all staff must agree to.

Trump, whose net worth is more than an estimated $5 billion, has a bulk of his wealth tied up in stock for Trump Media & Technology Group, the publicly traded company that runs Truth Social, and his ties to foreign business interests and potential conflicts of interest have repeatedly come under scrutiny.

He also has advertised a number of products bearing his name, including watches, guitars and shoes, and Trump and his sons embarked on a cryptocurrency venture in the days before Election Day. His Trump Organization also has global real estate holdings, though Trump and his empire are on the hook for tens of millions of dollars in financial penalties for fraud tied to the family business. Trump is appealing that judgment.

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Trump’s alleged resistance to signing an ethics pledge is a “red flag pointing to nothing so much as greed and corruption and an intention to enrich himself and/or his family through the extensive powers of his office,” according to Virginia Kase Solomón with democracy advocacy group Common Cause.

“Americans expect and deserve a president who prioritizes the nation’s well-being over personal gain,” she added. “They will not tolerate a president who abuses the powers of his office to line his own pockets.”

The plan requires transition team members to “avoid both actual and apparent conflicts of interest” and to “safeguard classified information” and “non-public information and other information that is not readily available to the public.”

It also blocks team members from lobbying activities and prohibits them from serving as registered foreign agents while working during the transition

Without thorough reviews of the incoming administration’s financial withholdings and interests by the Office of Government Ethics, those nominees could be in a position to benefit from their proximity to power, according to Campaign Legal Center counsel Kedric Payne, a former deputy chief counsel with the Office of Congressional Ethics.

“Without this crucial review — which is mandated by law — nominees may enter office with conflicts of interest (obvious or hidden) that they are not ordered to remedy,” Payne said in a statement.

If that happens, “not only are Americans deprived of critical information about those poised to hold immense power, but those power holders could manipulate the government for their own personal benefit while facing little to no consequence,” he added.

Trump’s dismissal of ethics obligations is not only a “break from precedent” but a potentially illegal and “dangerous” scene setter for the years to come, according to Payne.

“If we do not bother to hold some of the most politically powerful members of our government to ethical guidelines before they even enter office, there is little hope that these leaders will bother with ethics guidelines throughout their public service,” he added.