About Craig Holman

Posts by Craig Holman:

revolving door

Civic groups, academics urge Congress to support the Executive Branch Conflict of Interest Act

,

Hearings are continuing on H.R. 1, the landmark elections and ethics bill. One part of the bill that deserves more attention is what it would do to slow the revolving door. Learn more about this issue and how we can address it by reading this letter that we recently sent to the U.S. Senate.

Dear Senators:

We, the undersigned groups and individuals, write in support of the Executive Branch Conflict of Interest Act sponsored by Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisc.), a key section in Title VIII of the sweeping reform legislation, H.R. 1. This legislative proposal would slow the revolving door both into, and out of, the federal government and dramatically rein in the capture of regulatory agencies by corporations and special interests these agencies oversee.

The revolving door has long been a pernicious problem, in which corporations and special interests seek to exercise undue influence over public policy through two key strategies. First, by getting like-minded corporate executives and lobbyists appointed to governmental agencies that regulate them in the public sector; and, second, by securing an insider connection with these same agencies by hiring government officials leaving public service as executives and lobbyists for the corporations and special interests in the private sector.

Today the revolving door is spinning at alarming speed, with more lobbyists filling the ranks of cabinet offices and regulatory agencies than seen in decades, and at the same time former government officials and procurement officers freely moving into lucrative private-sector jobs with the same companies they had previously overseen. This well-oiled revolving door raises the very real concern among the public of whose interests are being represented by our government.

The Executive Branch Conflict of Interest Act tackles the revolving door head-on, both into and out of government. Among other things, the Act would:

  • Outlaw Bonuses for Government Work (Golden Parachute): The legislation prohibits government employees from accepting bonuses from their former private-sector employers for entering government service – a golden parachute that may endear or obligate incoming officials to their former employers.
  • Expand Cooling-Off Periods and Tighten Lobbying Rules:The legislation increases the prohibition on former government officials lobbying the federal government from one to two years. Even more importantly, it bans former regulators from even providing “strategic consulting” on behalf of lobbying campaigns for two years – a frequently-used means to evade today’s revolving door restrictions. It also prohibits procurement officers in the federal government from working for companies that received contracts overseen by the procurement officers during their last two years in government service.
  • Reduce Conflicts of Interest:The legislation requires senior government regulators to recuse themselves from any official actions that directly or substantially benefit their former employers or clients for whom they worked in the previous two years before joining public service.

Importantly, the Executive Branch Conflict of Interest Act would not eliminate cooperation between the government and industry, nor would it prevent agencies from hiring employees with private-sector expertise. It is designed to mitigate the worst effects of the revolving door and protect the integrity of governmental service.

The Executive Branch Conflict of Interest Act would establish clearer boundaries between the government and those who seek self-serving interests from the government, and will help affirm that governmental agencies serve the public’s interest.

For these reasons, we strongly encourage you to support and co-sponsor the Executive Branch Conflict of Interest Act.

Sincerely,

American Oversight
Campaign for Accountability
Center for Biological Diversity
Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW)
Coalition to Preserve, Protect & Defend
Common Cause
Corporate Accountability
Democracy 21
End Citizens United Action Fund
Equal Justice Society
Norman J. Ornstein
People Demanding Action
Prof. James A. Thurber
Project on Government Oversight (POGO)
Protect Democracy
Public Citizen
Stand Up America
Sunlight Foundation
Take On Wall Street
Voices for Progress

wall-3636206_1280

Trump’s Plan Runs into a Wall

,

Trump’s latest proposal to pay for a border wall very likely is illegal – a violation of the Anti-Deficiency Act.

Backing down from his pledge to shut down the government if Congress doesn’t allocate $5 billion to build the wall, Trump is now proposing that various agencies throughout the administration find surpluses in their budgets and allocate those surpluses toward building his wall.

The problem is – even if such surpluses exist in agency budgets – that money has been specifically authorized by Congress for other purposes, not for building a wall at the Mexican border. The Anti-Deficiency Act appears to prohibit using these funds for any purpose not authorized by Congress.

Normally the Anti-Deficiency Act is easily sidestepped because of Attorney General opinions that have narrowed its scope, such as not applying the Act to the White House since the White House is not an agency, and exempting volunteerism as long as the volunteer agrees not to seek compensation.

But in this instance, the second clause of the Anti-Deficiency Act seems to apply. 31 USC 1341(a)(1)(B) prohibits federal employees of agencies from involving the “government in a contract or obligation for the payment of money before an appropriation is made unless authorized by law.”

Trump may ask for the funds without violating the Anti-Deficiency Act since the law does not apply to the White House, but officials of the various agencies are not permitted to make any obligation for expenditures that have not yet been appropriated by Congress. Congress would have to appropriate these expenditures to make them permissible.

Again, this law is rarely invoked because of so many loopholes. The White House could try to argue that 31 USC 1341(a)(1)(B) merely prohibits an agency from making obligations for an expenditure before Congress has appropriated the money. Since the funds at the agencies have already been appropriated, Trump could argue that the law does not apply.

But I would read the Anti-Deficiency Act to be spot-on in this circumstance, since the appropriation language for these funds never authorized an expenditure for the wall. This constitutes spending money for a purpose never authorized by law or by the appropriations language.

Just to be clear, though, the Anti-Deficiency Act was designed to prevent agencies from spending money prior to authorization or in excess of authorization. In other words, it is intended to prevent agencies from spending money they do not have.

However, the Act’s emphasis that expenditures must be authorized by Congress strongly indicates that funds not authorized for the wall cannot be spent for that purpose. Allocating an agency’s surplus funds for the wall prior to any authorization by Congress would constitute a violation of 31 USC 1341(a)(1)(B) of the Anti-Deficiency Act.

Capture

30 Ways the Trump Administration May be Violating Its Own Ethics Rules

, ,

On a Saturday afternoon about a week into his term, President Trump issued an ethics executive order designed to implement his campaign pledge to “drain the swamp.”

The ethics order came as a surprise to many and borrowed some key provisions from President Barack Obama’s earlier ethics executive order. A key provision of the ethics order prohibits former lobbyists from being appointed without a waiver to governmental positions that oversee the same specific issue area they lobbied within the past two years. The relevant clause of the order reads, in part:

“If I was a registered lobbyist within the 2 years before the date of my appointment…I will not for a period of 2 years after the date of my appointment participate in any particular matter on which I lobbied within the 2 years before the date of my appointment or participate in the specific issue area in which that matter falls.”

However, in a report last year entitled “The Company We Keep,” Public Citizen identified dozens of appointments throughout the Trump administration that appear to violate this rule. Public Citizen has now sent 30 letters to the respective designated agency ethics officers requesting that they investigate and explain 30 such lobbyist appointments.  Numerous executive branch agencies and offices – including the White House itself – may have violated Trump’s ethics rules, according to Public Citizen, which has filed 30 ethics complaints against the agencies and White House.

These 30 apparent violations of Trump’s own ethics rules are only the tip of the iceberg. Public Citizen examined only a quarter of all presidential appointees because records were not readily available at the time, but the true number of potential violations may be fourfold.

Public Citizen’s previous research identified 36 lobbyists who have been appointed to positions that oversee the same specific issue areas they recently lobbied, with only six of those appointees having received publicly disclosed waivers from the ethics rule.

Violations of Trump’s ethics rules by the remaining 30 former lobbyists would occur if they are in any way involved in influencing official actions on the matters that they had recently lobbied in the private sector and have not received a waiver.

“The bottom line is that neither Trump nor his administration take conflicts of interest and ethics seriously,” said Lisa Gilbert, vice president of legislative affairs for Public Citizen. “‘Drain the swamp’ was far more campaign rhetoric than a commitment to ethics, and the widespread lack of compliance and enforcement of Trump’s ethics executive order shows that ethics do not matter in the Trump administration.”

johnsonamend3

Public Citizen Praises Congressional Leaders for Trying to Keep Politics Out of the Pulpit

Note: A group of nearly 100 lawmakers urged the leaders of the tax-writing U.S. House Ways and Means Committee to maintain the Johnson Amendment, which forbids churches and other tax-exempt 501(c)(3) organizations from endorsing or opposing candidates for public office. The lawmakers sent a letter calling for tax reform legislation that preserves limits on political activity by nonprofits.

Thousands of faith leaders, religious groups and civic organizations across the country have been pressing U.S. Congress to preserve the prohibition on charitable nonprofits from endorsing, opposing or contributing to political candidates. Public Citizen is proud to stand with them and praises the more than 90 congressional Democrats who went on record today opposing mixing politics with churches and other nonprofits.

The long-standing law known as the Johnson Amendment has kept churches, charities and other religious institutions who receive tax subsidies from getting in the middle of partisan politics. But that law is being challenged today in the congressional debate over re-writing the U.S. tax code. Several Republican members of Congress are following in President Donald Trump’s shoes and have proposed repealing the Johnson Amendment.

Americans do not want to see their tax-exempt churches and other charities picking sides in partisan squabbles and joining the rhetorical fray over how good or bad are the candidates for public office. Americans also do not want to see churches under pressure from government officials seeking their endorsements.

Politics does not belong in houses of worship or in the day-to-day operations of tax-supported charities and foundations.

Trump_Jr._(30627310851)

Donald Trump, Jr. Email Raises Host of Potential Criminal Violations

, ,

The revelation that Donald Trump, Jr. jumped on an offer to meet with a person described as a “Russian government attorney” bringing the Trump campaign gifts of documents that would injure the image of Hillary Clinton and help sway the election for Trump not only has ethical ramifications, it also raises a host of potential criminal violations.

On the ethical front, the stories given by Don Jr. as well as former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort and Trump adviser Jared Kushner keep changing. Neither Manafort nor Kushner declared that they had ever met with the Russian attorney on their mandatory disclosure forms.. As questions were raised, they later amended their disclosure forms to acknowledge such a meeting, as required by law. Donald Jr. was not required to file such a disclosure report, but he unequivocally denied any such meeting before it became public record. Earlier he told the New York Times: “‘Did I meet with people that were Russian? I’m sure, I’m sure I did,’ he said. ‘But none that were set up. None that I can think of at the moment. And certainly none that I was representing the campaign in any way, shape or form.'”

This week, Don Jr.’s own emails betrayed his earlier denials, as well as the non-disclosures of Manafort and Kushner.

On the legal front, federal campaign finance laws prohibit Americans from soliciting or accepting “anything of value” from foreign interests to be used to influence American elections. “Anything of value” has been broadly defined to include such things as polls and information that affect elections. This is precisely the type of information apparently promised by Natalia Veselnitskaya, the Russian attorney, for which Don Jr., reportedly agreed to a meeting, joined by Manafort and Kushner.

As Norm Eisen and Richard Painter, former ethics lawyers for Obama and Bush respectively, wrote for the New York Times, the meeting also raises questions of conspiracy with respect to espionage, “depending on how any illicit information was obtained and the level of their awareness of any spying.”

This whole sordid affair, once denied by the key players as ever having happened, now has the same players back-pedaling on their earlier misstatements – and all three have now hired personal attorneys.

Craig Holman, Ph.D. is currently Government Affairs Lobbyist for Public Citizen, focusing on campaign finance and governmental ethics.

Photo courtesy of Max Goldberg.

Load More