Tag: lack of ethics

Top Mnuchin aide’s private jet flight to Palm Beach was legal, but legal ‘does not always equate to wise,’ watchdog finds

The following article by Lisa Rein was posted on the Washington Post website November 1, 2017:

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin on Capitol Hill (Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images)

On his way to lunch with President Trump at the White House on a Thursday in March, a major GOP political contributor and hedge fund billionaire named Nelson Peltz stopped by Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin’s office to say hello to him and his chief of staff, Eli Miller.

Miller mentioned to Peltz that he was flying to Palm Beach, Fla., that night to visit his in-laws. Peltz said he was traveling there, too, and offered him a ride in his private jet. After getting a green light from Treasury’s ethics official, Miller accepted the ride, working and emailing on the flight while Peltz slept.

With a slew of senior Trump administration officials under scrutiny for their use of luxury air travel, the propriety of this trip came under investigation by the Treasury Department’s inspector general. Continue reading “Top Mnuchin aide’s private jet flight to Palm Beach was legal, but legal ‘does not always equate to wise,’ watchdog finds”

Citing Recusal, Trump Says He Wouldn’t Have Hired Sessions

The following article by Peter Baker, Michael S. Schmidt and Maggie Haberman was posted on the New York Times website July 19, 2017:

WASHINGTON — President Trump said on Wednesday that he never would have appointed Attorney General Jeff Sessions had he known Mr. Sessions would recuse himself from overseeing the Russia investigation that has dogged his presidency, calling the decision “very unfair to the president.”

[Read excerpts of The Times’s interview with President Trump.]

In a remarkable public break with one of his earliest political supporters, Mr. Trump complained that Mr. Sessions’s decision ultimately led to the appointment of a special counsel that should not have happened. “Sessions should have never recused himself, and if he was going to recuse himself, he should have told me before he took the job and I would have picked somebody else,” Mr. Trump said.

Continue reading “Citing Recusal, Trump Says He Wouldn’t Have Hired Sessions”

Trump Tweets ‘That’s Politics!’ About Son’s Meeting With Russian Lawyer

The following article by Maggie Haberman was posted on the New York Times website July 17, 2017:

WASHINGTON — He ran on a promise to end politics as usual.

But on Monday morning, President Trump posted a defense on Twitter of his son’s meeting with a Russian lawyer promising sensitive government information that could be damaging to Hillary Clinton by saying that it was simply politics as usual.

In Mr. Trump’s newest tweet about his eldest son, Donald Trump Jr., and a meeting on June 9, 2016, at Trump Tower, he described the gathering as routine and something almost anyone in politics would have wanted to attend. Continue reading “Trump Tweets ‘That’s Politics!’ About Son’s Meeting With Russian Lawyer”

Power struggle intensifies between White House and ethics office

The following article by Matea Gold was posted on the Washington Post website May 22, 2017:

Walter M. Shaub Jr., head of the Office of Government Ethics, has repeatedly been at odds with the White House. (Diego M. Radzinschi/ALM/National Law Journal)

White House officials are seeking to stop the federal government’s top ethics officer from getting details about waivers granted to lobbyists and other appointees working in the admin­istration, intensifying a power struggle between President Trump and the ethics agency.

Walter M. Shaub Jr., director of the Office of Government Ethics, sent a memo in April to the White House and federal agencies asking for information about such waivers. Continue reading “Power struggle intensifies between White House and ethics office”

State Department deletes online blog post that promoted Trump’s Mar-a-Lago

The following article by Colleen Shalby was posted on the Los Angeles Times website April 24, 2017:

Mar-a-Lago
Carolyn Kaster/Associated Press

President Trump’s oceanside Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida has gained considerable airtime and tweet time since Trump took office and dubbed it his winter White House.

It now has received official attention from the State Department.

The State Department’s “Share America” website, which shares “compelling stories and images that spark discussion and debate,” published a blog post about the compound ahead of Trump’s April 6 meeting there with Chinese President Xi Jinping. The post has since been deleted. Continue reading “State Department deletes online blog post that promoted Trump’s Mar-a-Lago”

Trump administration sought to enlist intelligence officials, key lawmakers to counter Russia stories

The following article by Greg Miller and Adam Entous was posted on the Washington Post website February 24, 2017:

National Security reporter Greg Miller explains why the Trump administration is
enlisting the help of intelligence officials and Members of Congress to counter
Russia stories.(Jorge Ribas, Ashleigh Joplin/The Washington Post)
The Trump administration has enlisted senior members of the intelligence community and Congress in efforts to counter news stories about Trump associates’ ties to Russia, a politically charged issue that has been under investigation by the FBI as well as lawmakers now defending the White House.Acting at the behest of the White House, the officials made calls to news organizations last week in attempts to challenge stories about alleged contacts between members of President Trump’s campaign team and Russian intelligence operatives, U.S. officials said. Continue reading “Trump administration sought to enlist intelligence officials, key lawmakers to counter Russia stories”