ETHICS/LEGAL/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT: “The chief ethics lawyer for President George W. Bush was baffled at the latest kerfuffle between the White House and the Office of Government Ethics.
On Monday [5-22-17], The New York Times reported that President Donald Trump’s White House refused to disclose to the OGE any ethics waivers granted to former lobbyists who now work in the administration.
Through a Freedom of Information Act request, the publication obtained a letter from Mick Mulvaney, the head of the Office of Management and Budget, to Walter Schaub, the head of the OGE. The letter asked Schaub to withdraw a request he sent to federal agencies to obtain copies of all the waivers the administration had given.
The Trump administration claimed in the letter that Schaub did not have the legal authority to demand the waivers. Painter said that wasn’t good enough.”
-Allan Smith, “‘There’s no reason whatsoever’ for it: The Trump administration’s latest battle with ethics officials is ‘extraordinary’,” Business Insider, May 23, 2017