Trump Will Make Our Government Honest Again
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump signs a hat for a supporter after speaking at a campaign rally on April 11, 2016 in Albany, N.Y. Eduardo Munoz Alvarez/Getty Images hide caption
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Eduardo Munoz Alvarez/Getty Images
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump signs a lid for a supporter after speaking at a entrada rally on April 11, 2016 in Albany, N.Y.
Eduardo Munoz Alvarez/Getty Images
President Trump's campaign rallies were divers by 3 slogans, 3 syllables each, which the candidate led the crowd in chanting: "Build the wall," condemning illegal immigration; "Lock her upward," attacking Democratic rival Hillary Clinton; and "Drain the swamp," all about cleaning up Washington.
At a Wisconsin rally concluding Oct, Trump announced, "It is fourth dimension to drain the swamp in Washington, D.C. This is why I'm proposing a parcel of ethics reforms to brand our government honest once again."
The phrase "bleed the swamp" didn't originate with the Trump campaign. Advocates of tougher laws on political money and lobbying have used it for years.
But Trump had a plan. Trump promised to impose stronger "revolving door" rules, which basically say an official cannot leave government then offset lobbying his or her former colleagues. He did what he said he would do: Gear up a v-year revolving-door ban for his appointees; it'southward in an executive lodge on ethics he issued in Jan.
He as well said he would enquire Congress for a 5-year lobbying ban on senators, representatives and superlative staffers. (They currently face up 1- or two-year bans under separate House and Senate rules.) There'southward no record of the White House actually making that asking.
Just closing the revolving door for ex-appointees doesn't address a current problem: the date of Washington lobbyists to the agencies that oversee their former employers. An assortment of such conflicts of interest were recently reported in the New York Times.
Steve Ellis, of the fiscal watchdog group Taxpayers for Mutual Sense, said it makes sense to hire people who already know the issues, merely information technology's essential "to make sure the people accept the taxpayers' interest at heart when they're working in government."
Trump said his plan would shut the legal loophole by which lobbyists avoid registering under the Lobbying Disclosure Act, which would compel them to disclose their activities. (This was an consequence for Newt Gingrich, now a Trump adviser, when he ran for president in 2012.) Simply changing the law requires congressional activity, and and so far no lawmakers have introduced the necessary legislation.
Trump's executive social club on ethics, besides setting the revolving-door rules, carries out another pledge. It imposes a lifetime ban on senior executive co-operative officials' lobbying on behalf of a strange government. (President Obama's executive order on ethics also had this ban.)
At that Wisconsin rally, Trump had ane more reform: "I'm going to ask Congress to pass a campaign finance reform that prevents registered strange lobbyists from raising money in American elections and politics."
Simply if he has asked, Congress hasn't responded. No beak has been introduced.
Still, the promise to drain the swamp "is a cardinal topic to why President Trump won this election," said John Pudner, manager of a conservative skilful-regime group called Have Back Our Democracy. His sense of the situation now: Trump started strong on the ethics issues but needs to do more follow-upwards.
Pudner also sees a trouble, though: Trump'due south own decision to maintain buying of his business empire, through a transparent trust that designates him as the but casher. Pudner said information technology would have been wiser to avoid conflicts of interest by divesting — selling — the businesses, as other contempo presidents have done.
"I think divestiture is the thing that moving forward calls into question what'due south being done, and that needs to be a priority still," Pudner said.
Already, a battalion of progressive groups is scrutinizing Trump's conflicts of interest. Coiffure — Citizens for Responsibility and Ideals in Washington — sued him every bit soon as he took office.
"We and a lot of others are watching closely to see what his business organization interests are and how they evolve, and what kind of actions he takes as president," said Crew president Noah Bookbinder.
The administration recently has appeared to rethink what "draining the swamp" really ways.
In a statement to NPR, the White House said Trump has "kept his promise of not being swayed by special interests" equally he attacks the swamp. The argument cited four examples: his executive gild on ethics, "pregnant regulatory reform," the government hiring freeze and a directive to examine waste material at federal agencies.
When Mick Mulvaney, director of management and budget, made a video nigh government efficiency recently, he said, "President Trump calls it draining the swamp. What information technology really ways is making the government more accountable to y'all, more effective and more than efficient."
But if draining the swamp means less lobbying, that isn't happening. Since Election Day, the number of new lobbyist registrations is up compared with a year agone.
Source: https://www.npr.org/2017/04/26/525551816/trumps-efforts-to-drain-the-swamp-lagging-behind-his-campaign-rhetoric
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