Whenever the subject of Trump’s business interests comes up, a majority of people conveniently overlook the fact that a lot of his assets are in real estate. Now sure, you CAN put stuff like that into a blind trust–but it won’t have much practical effect. Some people seem to be under the impression that if Trump puts his assets into a trust, the mere act of doing so will somehow magically make him forget what pieces of property he owns.
Presumably if he ever does forget which properties he owns, the four-foot-high letters spelling out his name on the side of the buildings will remind him.
Trump’s attorney announced that he will be putting his financial interests in a blind trust to be administered by three of his children.
That’s not what a “blind trust” is.
Today it was announced that those three children will also be serving on Trump’s transition team.
That’s really not what a “blind trust” is.
As noted, a blind trust is nonsense in Trump’s situation., where the assets are obvious and the managers are his kids. What we should expect is lots of fodder for conflict of interest. The media hates Trump and this will likely be one source they heavily mine for one of Trump’s many, many scandals.
What a load of crap-If the media actually hated Trump they wouldn’t have given him all that free press. The media could have buried Trump if they actually hated him.
I predict their interest in promoting Trump as a prime source of news ratings will morph into an obsession with Trump scandal once he takes office. That will be exacerbated by his efforts to resist their access. People thought that Clinton was obsessed with privacy? A narcissist egomaniac with Brietbart as his publicity arm is going to be miles worse, and the 4th estate will push back with floods of FOIA requests and lengthy exposes on his questionable practices.
From a concurrent Pit thread:
Which ethics regulations and laws apply here? What Conflict of Interest laws?
I’ve asked SteveG1 to join us here, but does anyone else know specifically which regulations and/or laws apply here?
Because so far, most people are saying there are no laws that apply.
It’s well known that Trump doesn’t do email and doesn’t even have a computer at his desk. Other than his smartphone for the public tweets, he does everything through phone calls or by messengers delivering either verbal or written messages.
FOIA? Phooey!
With the most perfect vision - Bigly vision, much much better than a regular blind trust. The best blind trust, I promise…
As Trump has aptly demonstrated, the facts don’t mean anything. This is basically what a Coen Brothers political thriller would look like.
Here is a brief article in the Wall Street Journal explaining why there is really no limit on Trump using his position as president to influence his business interests. Unlike normal Federal employees, the president is not restricted from maintaining outside interests specifically so that this does not limit the executive authority of his power. Use of that power to the benefit of the nation is largely an exercise of trust, something that neither major party candidate was in particularly good standing, but Trump is an outright fraud.
There is one particular issue that may come back to cause Trump significant legal problems; it is clear that Russia made significant efforts to manipulate the US election, most notably in the hacking of the DNC and DCCC servers and releasing that information. If it comes to light that there was collusion or conspiracy in by Trump in making this happen, it would be grounds for espionage as well as politically devastating. Given the presumption that the GOP would like nothing better than a viable excuse to turn sentiment against Trump and dump it, it is about the only thing at this point that would be an avenue toward impeachment. However, there does not appear to be any supporting evidence, and Putin has his own interest in skewing the election without having to be spurred by Trump. But just the reality that Russia engaged in this kind of political espionage may be enough to case considerable doubt on the integrity of any relationship Trump wants to build with Putin. The question remains about how many people will care; this campaign has made clear how little many people care about blatantly unethical behavior and bombastic, unworkable “policies”, as long as it all sounds good.
Stranger
They SAY it’s a blind trust, so therefore it is. It’s only the Media and the Elites, together with those criminal democrats who disagree.
http://www.dod.mil/dodgc/defense_ethics/dod_oge/comp_fed_ethics_laws.pdf
The federal ethics laws, in all their glory
Unfortunately
Excellent post SteveG1; thank you for joining this discussion.
So it seems that legally, Mr. Trump could actually continue to run the Trump Organization if he chose to.
I did not know that the POTUS and VPOTUS were exempted like that. I think we should ask Congress to close those loopholes at the first opportunity.
I wonder what happens to Trump Tower; especially if Trump really does keep it has his primary residence? The Secret Service is already upping security on it (& the FAA’s declared a no fly zone), but at the end of the date it’s still a public building with hundreds of residential, office, & retail tenants. Unless they evict everyone not connected to the Trumps they’ll never have anywhere near as much control over they of the White House.
I wonder: what would the public think of a President who didn’t live in the White House?
My guess is that nobody will think anything they don’t already thing of him.
A more specific question would be what the public would think about a President who constantly flies back and forth on the public’s dime.
He couldn’t possibly sleep at the White House, what with all the renovations underway…
Obama is criticized for even one vacation because of the cost but Trump…
Lock her up! Lock her up!