'What illegal corruption looks like': Why experts are blasting Trump for 'already breaking the law'
11 November 2024
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U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren is criticizing President-elect Donald Trump, asserting he is violating a mandatory ethics law regarding presidential transitions and conflicts of interest—provisions which she says she wrote—and that refusal could have impacts on national security preparedness. Trump signed updates to this law during his first term in office.
“Donald Trump and his transition team are already breaking the law,” Senator Warren wrote. “I would know because I wrote the law. Incoming presidents are required to prevent conflicts of interest and sign an ethics agreement. This is what illegal corruption looks like.”
The Massachusetts Democrat pointed to a CNN report that reveals Trump “has not yet submitted a series of transition agreements with the Biden administration, in part because of concerns over the mandatory ethics pledge vowing to avoid conflicts of interest once sworn in to office.”
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“Both Trump’s and his family’s foreign business ties have also come under intense scrutiny throughout his time in office and on the campaign trail,” the report notes. “Trump and his transition team are already behind in accessing key transition briefings from the Biden administration, as they have failed to sign a pair of agreements to unlock critical information before taking over the federal government in 72 days.”
CREW, the federal government watchdog, in a report updated just after Trump left office 2021, reported he had “promised a firewall between his business and his presidency, but he broke that promise and accumulated 3,403 conflicts of interest so far. The conflicts include visits to Trump properties by foreign government officials, taxpayer spending at Trump businesses, and Trump’s own blatant promotions of the businesses. CREW has tracked around two conflicts of interest per day, but that is likely only the tip of the iceberg.”
“Experts are sounding the alarms about impacts to Day 1 national security preparedness,” CNN also reports.
The New York Times notes that the Trump transition team “has missed multiple deadlines for signing required agreements governing the process. That has prevented Mr. Trump’s transition team from participating in national security briefings or gaining access to federal agencies to begin the complicated work of preparing to take control of the government on Jan. 20, 2025.”
Separately, one researcher pointed to a report on the 9/11 terror attacks.
“The 9/11 Commission found that the delayed transition affected national security for months after the inauguration, which may have contributed to 9/11,” according to E. Rosalie Li, who writes about public health, national security, and public policy. “On the day of the attacks, only 57% of the top 123 Senate-confirmed positions were filled at the Pentagon, the Justice Department, and the State Department combined, excluding ambassadors, U.S. marshals, and attorneys.”
Richard Painter, the well-known professor of law and former chief White House ethics lawyer summed it up: “Here we go again. Vintage 2016. Come on @realDonaldTrump, let’s sign the ethics agreement and get on with it.”
Max Stier, the president and CEO of the Partnership for Puboci Service outlined some of the agreements the Trump transition is late in signing, if they sign them at all.
Watch the video below or at this link.