Transcripts For CSPAN2 Government Ethics Trump Administration 20180125

We are so happy to see you here this afternoon. I am nicole austinhillery, director of the Brennan Center for office. We want to thank our friends here for cohosting this event with us this afternoon and being such a great partner for the Brennan Center for justice. On behalf of the Brennan Center we are pleased you joined us this afternoon for what we know will be an exciting and interesting conversation on president ial ethics law and this is a particularly good moment to have that discussion. The Brennan Center for those who dont know is a nonpartisan policy institute that seeks to improve our broken system of justice and democracy and we like to use the tools of advocacy, research, litigation and Strategic Communication to do just that. We work on what we think are very cutting edge issues like voting rights, money and politics, ethics, criminal justice reform, racial justice, fair courts and a host of other issues to do just that. Make our democracy and Justice System stronger and more effective for all americans. Please follow the Brennan Center if you dont already on facebook and twitter, check out our videos and podcasts on itunes, youtube and the multimedia section of brennancenter. Org. That said im pleased to introduce our moderator for todays program, kimberly atkins, chief washington reporter and Political Columnist for the Boston Herald, please join me in washington to welcome kimberly. Thank you. Donald trumps decision to keep control of his Business Empire displays conflict of interest is but one of a number of ethical controversies that have made headlines since Inauguration Day a year ago. An informal guardrail that constrain selfdealing by those in power fall by the wayside. What can be done to shore up federal ethics laws to give the Public Confidence that their leaders will put the interests of the American People first . What are the most significant gaps that exist in our system of federal ethics regulation . What are the special challenges that accompany any effort to regulate the president s conduct in office and what are the most promising ideas for reform . Those other questions we are tackling today with our esteemed panel of guests including Kathleen Clark from Washington University. Walter shaub, ethics director of the Campaign Legal center and former director of the office of government ethics and daniel weiner, senior of the Brennan Center for justice at nyu school of law. Welcome to the Brennan Center of justice at nyu dc. Okay. So, my name is kimberly atkins, im a Political Columnist and reporter for the Boston Herald. I want to start our discussion and note in the beginning we will have time at the end for questions so hold them tight and we will come to that a little later but i want to start out talking about the background of federal ethics laws and how do they apply to the president. That is a good question. Some federal ethics laws apply to the president , one of the most important, which is the federal prohibition on conflict of interest does not and that exemption dates back to the late 80s although it was implied before. What is interesting of course, most folks know this is historically, president s notwithstanding that they were not prohibited from having conflicts of interests took voluntary steps, sometimes quite elaborate steps to avoid them nonetheless and usually that took the form, my copanelist will correct me if i am wrong, worked in this space longer than i have but usually took the form either of the types of assets they held were submitted to diversified mutual funds and Bank Accounts and that sort of thing or placing other types of things in a blind trust which was shielded from their control and increasingly their knowledge. That is a key element of federal ethics that does not apply to the president. Of the rules including bribery, no one has ever suggested they dont. We have ever proven that because the president has never been prosecuted. They have to disclose something but there are significantly fewer constraints than virtually every other federal official other than the Vice President. Talk a little bit about the rules that were put in place to complement and supplement the existing Legal Framework when it comes to regulation, regulating ethics. With regard to the president , it is true the president is not covered by primary, a conflict of interest statute but the way i look at that is the law doesnt impose a criminal penalty for the president s conflict of interest but that doesnt mean as the president asserted a year ago that a president cant have conflicts of interest. The president obviously and have a conflict of interest because anything that creates the financial interest that runs contrary to the duties of your position and a president can certainly do that and we have seen this president to that. Not entirely true that no laws cover the president with regard to conflicts of interest or ethics in general, technically the president is covered by the ethics gift rules although oge created an exemption, an exception for the president that allows him to accept certain gifts. Interestingly in the past year it was effective january 1st but was approved and issued as a final ruling prior to that in 2016, creating a new requirement that you should consider, if you can accept a gift because an exception applies should you accept it and would it create a concern on the part of a reasonable person with knowledge of the relevant facts as to whether or not this would impede your impartiality in decisionmaking or lead you to give greater access to someone. I dont suspect for a second that is actually being applied but it should be and Good Government groups and reporters and the public should be asking if they see them accept a gift what was your analysis and applying those factors. Another obscure provision that applies to the president is in 2012 Congress Passed the stock act, stop trading on congressional knowledge act and it was somewhat incorrectly reported that the law had been rescinded. It is not been rescinded. It is in place. When transparency was curtailed and rolled back a bit but the law was originally response to a 60 minutes piece that suggested members of congress were profiting from their position by engaging in trades around the time laws were being passed and other decisions being made and it was initially intended to apply only to the legislative branch and president obama called on congress to shame them in a state of the union speech then you should pass it. That prompted a reaction where they extended coverage to the executive branch and said we will pass it all right and it became like a Christmas Tree of people hanging ornaments on it because there were 30 different amendments added in the final two weeks or so. One of the provisions defined the president as an employee meaning all of the new restrictions imposed on an employee apply to the president and one of the restrictions was the requirement under section 17 to recuse from any particular matter affecting financial interests of anyone you have an arrangement with for future employment or compensation or negotiating for one of those and that is interesting because it imposes a recusal requirement on the president and as we will discuss later, that is the subject of constitutional debate whether or not congress can impose a recusal requirement on the president but in fact they have just hasnt been challenged because no one tried to insert its coverage. But that was a crossing of a threshold and i dont know they did it deliberately but as with any legislative history you have to assume they knew what they were doing. A bold assumption. Lets talk about what is missing, some of the loopholes in these rules as you lay them out. Give is your view of that. I want to emphasize the countrys first conflict of interest laws is apply, theres conflict of interest found in the United States constitution. The emoluments clause and domestic emoluments clause and those indicate the president or any Government Official is prohibited from accepting something of value from a Foreign Government and that has been the subject of some litigation but what i think that represents is our framers recognize the danger Government Officials including the president could be influenced by money or anything of value they received. In terms of exceptions, problems that need to be filled i think what dan identified, the fact that in 1989 congress amended the criminal financial conflict of interest statute so that it exempted the president and the Vice President from its reach. That was a mistake and if we go back a couple more decades to 1962 when president kennedy was submitting a comprehensive set of Ethics Reforms before Congress President kennedy included an exemption for the president and Vice President , congress rejected it. From 1962 on, imposed on the president and Vice President financial conflict statute, that is one thing, congress, when we get a congress that cares again about our founding principles and conflict of interests and protecting the public trust, when we get that congress i think that Congress Needs to reenact the financial criminal conflict of interest provision on the president is the other thing i want to mention, another problem in the conflict of interest standards or ethics standards, this is a process issue. Government officials, highlevel officials are required by statute to fill out somewhat detailed forms about their financial interests but the statute is that it has been interpreted so that if the Government Official has a business, the official does not need to disclose the debt and financial relationship of that company but we have a president who has hundreds of llcs and the office of government ethics has interpreted the statute, the disclosure statute, he is not required to disclose Financial Relationships of those llcs including the death coat of those llcs those companies so we have Financial Disclosure laws adequate for many of the people in the room or someone like myself but theyre not adequate to deal with someone who is using, has their own company because it has been interpreted not to require disclosure. For someone like trump, Jared Kushner, we need to change the law so we can get visibility into the Financial Connections including the debt of their own companies. In addition to not having to disclose the debt, the other wacky think about disclosure, we have discussed this, if you ever see they disclosed in very broad ranges like 5 million to 25 million which for conflict of interest purposes just to see what your asset is may be adequate but one of the things we look that is if you look at other countries, italy, it wasnt Silvio Berlusconi was necessarily directly taking Government Action to benefit his media empire although he was some have said but it was a pattern of rent seeking businesses and sectors of industry buying advertising at inflated prices at his companies and increasing their value and that was the primary way he enriched himself from being Prime Minister of italy and we saw the same thing with the husband and wife president of argentina who owns a chain of hotels. When you have these broad ranges it obscures the extent to which certain assets might be increasing in value for reasons other than the market. Mara lago for instance made 7 million more in the most recent period than it did before the president became president. He disclosed that on his report, that is a good example, made mara lago a more attractive place to play and be a member now that it is run by the president of the united dates. That is something the forms would not necessarily reveal. One step back from this point and post to the panel, why should we care about these issues, why do we care about conflicts of interest. There are a lot of supporters of the president to say is a good businessman, he has the right to make money, we knew he was a businessman when he was elected so identify why we have these conflict of interest laws and why we care about them. If i could go back to a couple points. Kathleen knows she and i disagree on one point but it is a cheerful professional disagreement. I dont agree the 1962 law applied to the president. It is not a matter of going back to what was prior to the 1989 amendment. I it was understood at the time the criminal conflict of interest statute did not apply to the president and in 1974 Lauren Silberman writing on behalf of the department of justice wrote an opinion articulating that and that opinion was cited again in 1983 and by 1989 when they put that in there was some nervousness at the tail end of the Reagan Administration about consequences for some alleged issues but i dont think anyone seriously thought at the time that they were changing it, they thought they were codifying it. In terms of liabilities for companies i am the one who certified the president s Financial Disclosure and stand by that. It was compliant to the extent that he disclosed. Theres no way they could know that. I agree with the other two panelists that the laws are inadequate to deal with the situation we are in terms of disclosure but the treatment of privately Held Companies, you dont have to disclose their liabilities or Business Partners is consistent with the rest of the application of statute because for instance if you hold stock in cocacola or exxon or any other large publicly traded company you are not necessarily going to know as a random person who called of your broker and said to buy shares of cocacola and 50 shares of exxon what the Companies Liabilities are or who is affiliated. So i think we are seeing, privately Held Companies and privately held Family Companies like Donald Trumps familys company, Jared Kushners familys companies and the nominee to be the head of noah in the department of commerce his name is barry myers who is coming from accuweather which is a very closely held Family Company and though this is a new problem we have not had a lot of experience dealing with and the law hasnt caught up with the fact that now we have Public Officials with these privately Held Companies and in terms of the ranges, i look at it as a technician. Im not sure i agree we need to break the ranges into more pieces, particularly on the value side because if you have a one dollar asset it is still a conflict of interest unless theres an exemption that applies. It might be more important on the income side. If you are seeing a greatly increased revenue stream that might be more indicative, the valuation, i take your point it may be less important. We stripped publicly traded companies out of that because im not sure theres any purpose in knowing dividends from a publicly traded company but these privately Held Companies you can see fluctuations and want to know what that is about but this goes back to why does this matter . Most basic core, a question of corruption, whether or not somebody is misusing or abusing the authority entrusted to them for their own personal gain or the personal gain of some other private individual or company, if we have people going into government to enrich themselves or enrich others by using governmental authority, i dont mean collecting their salary but using Government Authority entrusted by the people to be used for their benefit but use that for your own benefit, then that calls into question the legitimacy of government as a concept much less in the individual case. That is the hallmark of the countries that we label banana republics where leaders can just help themselves. There are rumors Vladimir Putin has used all his authoritarian power to perhaps become a the richest man in the world or one of them. And why are we entrusting authority to people but even beyond the actual misuse is, in a civilized modern western society the sense that we shouldnt even have to ask the question. The burden should be on the Government Official to take whatever actions they can to show us that there is no remaining conflict of interest and that is as it should be because the public cant have access to enough information to know the link between a financial interest and a decision is very hard to draw and so in many cases we find ourselves highlighting the smaller violations that are the canary in the coal mine that tell us there is a broader ross going on, but in reality we shouldnt even have to ask because the Government Official should be able to say i cleared the decks on this and eliminated conflicts of interest so that you can know that my decisions are based on the policy aims that i declared when you voted for me rather than on my own personal enrichment or the personal enrichment of a third party. We had president s who have taken that approach even though criminal stats didnt apply to them until now. Walt mentioned russia. Another example is venezuela which was actually, a very stable, prosperous market for many years and people of chavez having changed that but he was partly a reaction to the corruption at the top of venezuela before. There is a vast array of literature the documents the extent to which perceptions under my the publics faith in Democratic Institutions and we are seeing a worldwide trend in reduced faith in democracy and the United States is not immune to that. To continue the canary in the coal mine metaphor, ethics, i think to some extent is indicative of a broader range of democratic concerns because if you take the idea the president can have a conflict of interest to the extreme you get the idea the president s interests are coterminous with that of the state, what louie xiv said, that takes you into a different philosophy than what our country was founded on so these are very important because if you worry about executive power, i dont want to harp on the president s businesses but i dont want him to exceed his constitutional authority, the two things are very connected and we should worry about this if we are worried about the broader array of the presidency and what it means. I want to get some proposed solutions about reform. I will start with you, kathleen. What are the limits of ethics laws . Is it set by the constitution or Something Else . If we take a look at foreign and domestic emoluments clausees that tells us our founders were concerned about conflicts but also helps ground us in something dan was alluding to, the idea our Government Officials are given public power not so they can exercise on behalf of themselves and family members but on behalf of their Public Interest, on behalf of all of us, and Government Officials have obligations to the people which is foundational. The ethics standards that are adopted by congress and regulators. And otherwise are expressions of that notion that Public Office is public trust. At the very heart of it, it is about Government Officials recognizing and acting as though they know obligations to us, not just to themselves selfishly. Almost all government ethics regulations complicated as they can get can be connected to the foundational principle that Public Office is a public trust. In attacking not the principles like Public Office in public trust but foundational protections for our democracy. Its all of what it seems to me. I want to make a pitch to people. The next president may not be a billionaire real estate developer. That may be a lefty tech titan from Silicon Valley or a media mogul. These restrictions will apply to that individual as to do apply to this president. Just because many people like this president does it mean you shouldnt care about this stuff. Every president i think tends to forget the next president may have very different philosophy and they reject constraints on themselves that they might like for their successors. I think thats important to keep in mind. Going back to what kathleen was just saying, thats a really good point about it goes to the fundamental purpose for us being a country and having a government. The question becomes what do you server the government or does a government serve you . If you serve the government as would be the case an authoritarian country where the king rules all, the leader rules all, then it might make sense to misuse the criminal investigative apparatus of the state to go after your vanquished political rival and punish them for having dared to run against you. Or if you live in a country where the government exists to serve you, maybe the criminal investigative apparatus was looking for crimes that are a threat to you right now. And not digging up things from the past that go beyond the statute of limitations in some case. Thats where you the bleeding over of, this is for me, as when they announced they will do offshore drilling and to put out a federal register notice even before the time closes, secretary zinke exempts the one state in which the president premier beachfront property exists, but everybody else has to wait. It begins to look like this date is for the benefit of the state and you are all its servants, as opposed to we have come to a social contract that we will have government to protect us in one way or another. I think as dan was emphasizing the concept of the canary in the coal mine is very broad because this is an indication of in many ways a trend towards authoritarianism, and a sense this is for my benefit as your leader as opposed to i am acting out your wishes. Just reminder this is the Brennan Center for Justice Program at nyu d. C. And we are talking to walter shaub, senior director of ethics of the Campaign Legal center and former director of the office of governmental ethics. Kathleen clark, professor of law the Washington University school of law, and daniel weiner, senior counsel of the Democracy Program at the Brennan Center. Im kimberly atkinson, she corresponded and coldness at the Boston Herald and you can follow us on facebook, on twitter and watch programs on youtube and listen to itunes podcast. All reports immediate are online at brennancenter. Org. I want to talk a little bit about solutions or proposed reforms that you all have. Maybe kick it off first with walter explained what oge does and why it seems at least from my perspective as a reporter covering these issues, that it was developed largely to be selfgoverning, at least when comes to the white house. And is one of your proposals tougher Enforcement Mechanisms for oge or Something Else out of that . The office of government ethics which alleged intel the summer is a prevention tool, plain and simple, thats what its here to do. I dont view it as part of the enforcement mechanism. Its part of the prevention mechanism, so my discussion of where to go from there stems from that. People come to the office of government ethics or to any of the 4500 Agency Ethics officials that it overseas and proactively asks for advice, and we have nominees coming to oge, opening up the Financial Assets and answering very intrusive questions that sometimes go beyond the bounds of what we need strictly for the forum in order to just be sure that there isnt anything we were missing that has to be addressed. By and large they tend to cooperate and this prevention mechanism, its very hard to quantify whats been prevented because your writing down what hasnt happened. I once said at the beginning of the speech that you dont hear much about ethics when things are going well, and thats precisely as it should be. But you dont see people knocking on the door of an Inspector General and say, im thinking about doing this thing, when you investigate me and see that i get thrown in jail if i do it . Nobody goes to the policeman for advice proactively. I think oge as role enforcement, which is coordinating with enforcement entities and delivering information that shows wrongdoing to them, but it turns to the interactive back and forth. I dont think you have that kind of interaction with the level of success that oge had had for 40 years until this past year, if people are having a report having to report themselves to the policeman to get advice. And so as a result oge ease authorities are somewhat limited, and i dont necessarily think conceptually thats a terrible thing. Yet remember that when i was a director of oge my immediate supervisor was the president at that point out to people i once let you to fill out a form, and for the life of me i cant member what it was but had write the name of my supervisor and i wrote donald j. Trump. I went back to make sure the knew i wasnt just being a smart alec. [laughing] , because he was literally my supervisor. And thats important to understand it because it is equipped with strict limitations oge because ultimately, the things we are seeing, the departures that occurred in the past year are the faults of congress that has refused to exercise the kind of oversight that you can be sure it would have exercised if the other candidate had one. Ultimately only congress is going to be able to impose consequences on a president. The president s employee isnt going to go to do that, and even if you gave them the authority to use it he would just fired them before became effective. We are already having to bite our nails hoping that Robert Mueller doesnt get fired and thats a criminal investigation and hes got the power to charge someone with obstruction of justice. There is no way that anybody talk about building and oge that is a special counsel like mueller. If you did then you have made a the decision to throw away a prevention mechanism that has prevented a lot of harm. You have to look at the tradeoffs, and i think theres a temptation in a lot of ways to want an easy fix to a complex problem. My experience in this world is that the world is nuanced and complex and easy fixes dont work well for complex problems. I think along the lines of something dan said. I made that comment about congress and some of the same congressman who have no interest in looking into anything going on now were asking questions and are still asking about what they call pay for play with a nonprofit, but have and by the way, thats a fair thing to look at. But how do you look at and have concerns about pay for play with the nonprofit when you have a forprofit with this president that is letting people pay for access to the president , and not use that same terminology . And so the lessons we learned in our civics classes in high schools are not working out because congress is in serving as a check. Even when mueller is done hes only going to release information that will either lead to somebody being convicted or is exculpatory nature because he is a constitutional responsibility to share that with the defendant. But beyond that you will not get answers. What we dont have is a 9 11 Type Commission thats looking at all aspects of what happened in the last election to really dive in and tell us in detail and write report like this that lays out everything they found that happened last year. That isnt happening because the constitutional check of congress overseen the executive branch isnt working when you have one party in charge of all of it. Thats not that i for one party or against. In fact, probably vote against any party having total control ever get even if it means voting against the candidate i like. But getting back to the fixes then, the question becomes what do you want to fix. Do you throw away 40 years that seem to work relatively well and is built upon itself and refine itself to the point where we were doing fine tuning rather than turning the bigger dial that move the new up and down the radio channel lex to those love you old enough to remember knobs on the radio. So the kinds of things i would like to see include, and i shared 13 proposals and it wont go through all of them but the kind of things i like to see is one way, you will hear that we disagree on this panel about some of the fixes, one of the things id like to see is, i think its in common with them, is an increase protection for the director of the office of government ethics. When i made my stand last year i was a guy who at student loans, no new job lined up, 19 years of federal service, one you short of a magic 20, and i thought i was going to be fired at 12 01 on january 20. I always get a kick out of the white house, that i did this for profit. Its like, man, ill trade shoes with you any day. The setting aside the deep dark cynicism and comments like that, i do think it would be helpful if the director of oge, like others in government, like inspectors general or the head of the office of special counsel, which is not Robert Mueller office but the office that investigates whistleblower retaliation could only be fired for cause, and congress had to be given 30 days notice with a written explanation, something as simple as that. Or i thought a battle with the white osseous records. Oge has all the authority it needs to gather records and information about ethics, but none of the power. The difference between authority and power is the authority for judge to issue an order, and power is the ability to send the u. S. Marshals to your doorstep when you dont comply. Oge has plenty of authority but new u. S. Marshals on hand. No. In terms of investigations i do think theres a gap in Investigative Authority because the are a number, dozens of small agencies that have no Inspector General. You also have the white house among them that is outside the scope of Inspector General. Give the igf full Inspector General authority to investigate anything coming out of there, the way and ig can, and a special Ethics Authority to conduct and ethics investigation in the white house or anywhere else in the government for good highlevel officials upon referral from oge. That also is a mechanism that prevents abuse because you could suddenly empower oge to be an investigative body, and one directors going make decisions about what to investigate. You could have the Ethics Program become a Political Tool in that case. But having a separate ig openly conducted special ethics investigation of the white house or elsewhere upon referral to oge, its like those old war movies with two guys in the missile silo who have to turn the get the same time from across the room. It means that you have to agree and then i have been appointed by different president s in many cases so that gives some protection. The one other i will cover briefly is my proposal for solving residential conflicts of interest. I dont think that a president should have to recuse because i do think we need a president to participate in everything. We cant have a National Crisis unfolding with splitsecond decisions needing to made and the presidency can somebody check the file and say do i need to reduce in this and not participate, and theres nobody to give away because he doesnt have a boss. But even if he did turning over the power of the executive branch. I dont know i agree with those that say its a constitutional problem because as i mentioned, congress has already composed of recusal requirement of a limited circumstance, but i think its a bad idea and dangers in the sense we need the president available for things. Id like to get us back to the tradition where president s involuntarily taketh me steps as humanly possible to resolve complex of interest voluntarily. One way i came up to do this and i proposed to congress was required him to disclose in writing to the office of government ethics their plan for addressing the complex of interest and have oge post it. Thats one piece of it. They key piece is that it happen before the first primary to decide whos going to be a parties nominee. Because the media failed to ask the questions last fall. The field ask Hillary Clinton what you going to do with the foundation . They failed asked donald trump recorder to do with all of these companies . Even if they done that in the fall of 2016 i dont think there were very many people in the world are going to change parties over that. But if you start asking the question when you have 16 people running for the same parties nomination understand, i suspect ted cruz or marco rubio or Chris Christie or jeb bush or john kasich or ben carson would have really thrown down with this president over his failure to come up with a plan to resolve conflicts of interest. And some people might of said that bothers me, ill vote for this other guy whos going to run for my parties nomination and i dont have to change parties. So the idea is disclosure by disclosure early enough. The final piece of it has to be you can amend it at any time in writing and rereleased it so that it becomes a race to the top. You come in and bit too low, the next candidate comes in and says im going to do this much more, and you take a beating at a town hall or debater something and you come back and you release and even higher plan and then they compete. I wonder if that might create enough pressure to get us back to voluntary compliance with the best teacher, rather than selling, investiture. I mean rather than recusal. The final thing i will say is something then set about it is cutting both ways, it cuts both ways in the bigger since. If you like donald trump you should be concerned somebody else would become president and keep the conflicts of interest, maybe Hillary Clinton will run you get and keep her foundation and just a few years ago you were chanting lock her up but i had to with it because you put it for donald trump. It cuts the same with for the other side, too. Theres a number of billionaires and multimillionaires toiling with the idea of running. If becoming it refused to resolve the conflict of interest, they have now sealed permanently in place the idea that a president doesnt ever have to worry about the complex of interest. If you take advantage of the fact they can say the other guy didnt do that, the other party didnt do that, but they come in and do it again, make no mistake about it, they are part of the problem and not part of the solution. So people need to hold their own party accountable, and on both sides put country before party. I think thats the challenge were seeing people fail now. I hope it stops, and i hope we dont start seeing the same behavior all around. I want to go to dan and kathleen about some other ideas or counter ideas a solution, but keeping in mind one question that comes to mind as walt was talking was, if the only way for president in particular is to take office is for him to completely divest himself of all of his earnings, special if he has a company the way President Trump does go put it in a blind trust or some of the way completely divest yourself, why would that dissuade people from running . Is that too much to ask someone to do . I want you guys to talk about that and also reforms as you see them. I personally dont think its too much to ask to ask a candidate for president to start putting country first. And so requiring divestment or a commitment to divest doesnt seem like too much to me. But i also want to just come back to something that walter shaub said, when you referred to the conflicts that the office of government ethics had with the white house back in may, in the spring of 2017. I believe it was with regard to whether the white house was going to discuss or publish and disclose these waivers that it had issued. You said that the office of government ethics didnt have much power to compel. I think you are right that the office of government ethics didnt have a traditional power, but what you really masterfully demonstrated is that you had soft power. I think that your interaction with the Trump White House with regard to the waivers and otherwise in 2017 is sort of a case study that really should be studied by students of Public Administration as well as law congress. But you not only have the commitment and the right position that the white house should disclose these waivers that pretty much showed that the ethics executive order was a bit of a joke in how it was ultimately used, but you got them to actually make these disclosures because you shame them into it, which is an amazing accomplishment that the office of government ethics was able to shame the white house and the White House Counsels Office into doing the right thing. I just want to highlight as we think of reform that we need to keep in mind that mainly refer to them as guardrails or norms rather than laws, but you are really youre really masterful handling of the conflict is something you deserve a lot of credit for, and also is perhaps something we need to look for ways to cultivate on the part of other accountability mechanisms within and out of government. I would add congress has a role because congress has used its Oversight Authority in the past not just to enforce law, to ensure compliance with the law, but also to enforce these unwritten norms. Past president s when they violated the norms, those triggered congressional investigations. I think congress does need to have that message reinforced. I do disagree with a couple things, although i agree with most of it and im kind of trembling at the thought of disagreeing disagree with you about ethics. But two things, i want to know where the longestserving federal Election Commission in the audience, and the sec is an example of the challenges that come with enforcing some of these guardrails and also has the dubious distinction of having to regulate the president , or at least the president s campaign while hes technically the commissioners boss. The fcc has its challenges but it is doable and many federal agencies, for instance, have an Enforcement Division that is walled off from the rest of the agency fec i can to think with the fec that Enforcement Division should be more powerful but there is a way to empower career Civil Servants to enforce some of these laws with oversight from the political appointees. I dont think its impossible for that to become oge, but i ao respect your point of view as having run oge and it doesnt have to be within oge. Thats a thought. I do, actually. I think theres something to be said for a culture of voluntary compliance and for people, a lot of agencies try to come and take her in a Financial Sector try to combine like supervision with enforcement, and the sort of confessor role and then the enforcement role here i think thats a larger discussion of how well that works and maybe they should be disaggregated. On conflict of interest for the president , that is were i do disagree. I think the reality is that the president is uninvolved in the vast majority of government decisions, that even some very highprofile decisions, the president is supposed to stand up like whether to prosecute people i know that is not the current occupants philosophy necessarily, although there is not necessarily an indication that is been accepted by even his own Justice Department. I just dont, im really having trouble understanding why refusing for the president and his own cabin does it all the time, Jeff Sessions did it, is such an insurmountable problem. There may be a smaller subset related to National Security or other things for it is not practical to ask the president to recuse. At that point you do start to look at divestment hereby agree with kathleen that you become leader of the free world pickups a lifechanging event. Jimmy carter had to sell his peanut farm. He chose to sell his peanut farm. George h. W. Bush had many business interests. He divested from them. I dont think its too much to ask and to think theres a way to expect president s to come up with a plan. I dont think the law should micromanage what the the presit does. I think the president with the people advising her or him should just be responsible for doing that. Why should the law not micromanage what the president does . And when we have proposals forward, say theres a complete shift in the congress and the administrations i had to say hey, we will put all of these ethics rules done to make sure nothing happens again, what is the risk of overregulated . I would say one of the issues is, the more you get into congress micromanaging the president finances, like you can have this, i do think there is constitutional concerns raised. President s are citizens, they are subject to the same laws of the rest of us. I dont believe that our constitutional concerns with subjecting to the president of conflict of interest longer la. Im not convinced if youre trying to have congress describe exactly what the president can or cant do. Like every other person in government, the president should have the obligation to comply and figure out how he or she is going to comply. As a practical matter, jimmy carter probably did not need to sell his peanut farm. Its nice that he did, maybe sad, i dont know, i never asked. I dont know that we need to force people to do that. I think theres some truth as you noted of not wanting, like if its that big of a drag to become leader of the free world, then fine, dont do it, you know . [laughing] but if it doesnt impact the Public Interest or if theres a less burdensome way to solve the problem, i think that its worth exploring the option. I understand President Trump is built a business that he is very proud of, and the are part of that business that probably could be solved by recusal instead of divestment. Theres a reason not to let them do that if it will solve the problem. Kathleen . I want to get into some of the nittygritty of the financial conflict of interest statutes, and walt and dan may shine some light that will help us understand how it would apply to the president. There are some matters that are so broad in scope that they dont, they are not even reached by the financial comfort of interest statute. So back in 1990 i believe it was, George Herbert walker Bush Administration sought a legal opinion from the Justice Department office of Legal Counsel to find out whether the u. S. Response to iraqs invasion of kuwait implicated the financial conflict statute for members of the cabinet and others who have Financial Holdings in oil companies. The office of Legal Counsel, the Justice Department indicated that the u. S. Response to the iraq invasion of kuwait was so broad in scope that the financial conflict of interest statute was irrelevant. It didnt have to be considered by those cabinet members. And so what i want to flag is this possibility that it may be that most of what a president does is so broad in scope that the financial conflict statute has no application at all to those policy proposals and decisions. On the other hand, i will tell you that if the president is getting involved in prosecution decisions of the Justice Department, that is something narrow enough that absolutely financial statute should apply. There are other reasons. I guess i would be interested in hearing from dan and walt on whether you have a handle on what percentage of the president s actual activities are likely to implicate the financial conflict statute that apply to the president . Since we have an audience with a wide range of backgrounds, ill try to stay high level but one of my concerns about applying the existing statute to the president is 18 usc section 208, which is referred to as 208 is that 208 is a very blunt instrument that is at once overbroad and too narrow. And it turns as you said there are some types of things that are covered by and some that are not, and its the difference between a matter, whatever that is, is not covered, and a particular matter is covered. And finding the line between the matter and in particular matter, what makes it particular enough, the definition is a matter that is focused on the interest of discrete and identifiable class of persons or parties, but in Practical Application there are people spend all day everyday trying to figure out what is a particular matter and where is the line between matter and particular matter. So some Party Matters are very narrow, like litigation, like the prosecution you mentioned, others are broader. For instance, a regulation affecting any industry. If it affects just one industry, the members of that industry are discrete and identifiable class of persons, but you get into a debate about whether new regulations for aspirin, this is an opinion, would be a particular matter, and some people arguing raise the price for all the consumers and all consumers in the world are not at discrete and identifiable class of persons. But the decision was a focus on the interest of the manufacturer, so it is. Thats a relatively clearcut example. It gives really wouldnt dropped off the edges. At oge because the more difficult questions filter up through a period of 4500 agencies ethics officials can we got all of the most confusing, vague, right on the edge of the line to the point where some day staff would lose state and say does any of this mean anything . Because it could be one way or the other. I would remind them that 80 of the time it makes sense, but we are dealing with highlevel officials are involved in unusual things and were living in the 20 were today its more a 5 were turns into quantum mechanics. Part of the problem is the temptation would exist with the president who is behaving, who is carrying out his conduct in the public eye more than any other Government Official. That would be great pressure to define that so narrowly anytime it was a debate the white house would, with detailed explanations of why its not a particular matter and they would probably call off the department of Legal Counsel to engage in mental gymnastics to doing post hoc rationalization about what the president did is okay. And in that starts gutting the criminal conflict of interest statute for a foothills. I worry at the top level these vagaries and be exploited by a president at that ultimately undermine the law that applies to everyone else if the same law were to apply to them. I could give you examples but probably i would wind up confusing myself and you because we just had had constant debates, including, for instance, after about 2007 or 2008 we worked with the department of justice and they concluded that a trade negotiation between two countries is an automatically a particular matter even though there are two parties, meaning the countries, because they are whole countries and get to look at the subject matter. If it affects all aspects of economy are a number of different sectors, its not a particular matter. Even though the thing that individual Government Employment work on is affecting only one industry. Soy president couldnt manipulate trade negotiations to his or her benefit and not be covered at this particular statute where in other areas they are overly covered because of the broad reach of that section. Its too broad and too narrow. The other thing is this statute requiring recusal only addresses topics of interest in the sense that a conflict of interest might influence your Decision Making so you stay out of the matter, you recuse and, therefore, you resolve the conflict of interest. But it doesnt get at efforts to curry favor with the president by funneling money to them which we see with people being willing to pay double the membership fee over the past year at maralago, or the d. C. Trump International Hotel making a profit in its first year when it was expected to lose money as most hotels do in the first year, not because they fill the room but because the people who want to be there, to rub elbows with white house officials who hang out in the bar, with a president who makes appearances there, are willing to pay well above market rates for the same rooms. So you have the danger of buying access or currying favor in addition to competent interest, and thats why among other reasons including the tactical reason of the damage it might do to legal interpretation, i dont think recusal and subjecting the president to the normal recusal statute is the best option. The two options that i think are really more realistic are either divestiture statute, because again this primary criminal conflict of interest statute is a recusal statute, but the government divestiture statute, the passenger is stronger medicine than recusal, so youd have to have more exceptions for a president. I could live with that, but i still think the better thing is to turn as back as a culture to voluntary compliance by rejecting it into the political process at a point when people dont have to switch parties. Because im not close from the president s behavior. When a president has a disinterested government ethics, thatll doesnt undermine the publics faith in government but it undermines governments officials they and officials here if the president can do, if my boss can do it why would i be held to a higher level standard that my boss . Fire of ecothe more power and influence, so the stricter the rules should be. If my boss can engage in nepotism and comforts of interest and misused his position to advertise his properties and why should i who have so much Less Authority than him behave . That becomes a corrupting government at all levels. If we can get back to being a country that is a model for all the rest of the world, and we see delegations, to oge to study our system. They dont i think admire us anymore, and we wont get there necessarily by legislation as much as i think, or at least as comprehensive lee as we would by creating an environment where people feel pressure to do the right thing. I do think though you have to acknowledge, wall, you alluded to this, there is a bell on ringing problem. It would be nice to get back to the norms of george h. W. Bush, and that would be great. I dont know that anyone has a solid idea of how to do that. And i think that the law is not a perfect substitute, but perfect cant be the enemy of the good. I happen to think that the Brennan Center has proposed extending couplets of interest law to the president. We also propose certain exceptions. We think would be appropriate for the president. There might be others. I tend to think that when the president signs legislation, that should be accepted from the conflict statute because the president role in the process is indispensable and he or she can would do anything without congress. That particular function should i give rise to a conflict. I also think a materiality threshold below which we just considering not relevant to a lot of states having the conflict machines might also be appropriate. But i think the devil is in the details and its not perfect but if we just say weve got to get back to these norms, im not sure an error of hyper polarization when people are very loyal to the party, i dont know thats going to happen. I want to say will go to questions pretty soon so if you have one we do have a microphone set up right over here. I think we can also pass it if thats better. So just think sorry, there is one on either side. You can head to the microphones to ask your question but im good as gwen moore, particularly as a newspaper reporter. I think about not just the president but of the people and whether there are reforms needed. Can you talk about other people . Should we be concerned about ivanka trump wearing her own clothes or traveling to china when she is patent deals with there . Should we be worried about Jared Kushner going to the middle east to try to affect peace when there are is really invested in his companies . Who else should we be worried about . I think Jared Kushner and the ivanka trump problem stems from the original sin of nepotism that was brought into the white house because it is so uncommon for white house officials to retain essman ff as they retained, nobody in the white house was willing to lean on them as hard as other officials because these were the president s own relatives. So i think we have a nepotism problem, but i think we dont see other people retaining the level of financial interest. I do think the concern that dan and kathleen expressed about privately Held Companies that i agree with is universally applicable to everyone, and is a dangerous cap. I do think it makes sense to treat at least family privately Held Companies, or and possibly privately Held Companies, differently than publicly traded companies. Kathleen . I think thats a really key reform, and this came up actually a few months ago when there were news stories related to i think referred to as the paradise papers, and secretary of commerce and a member of congress to a been involved i believe in the confirmation process didnt realize that our secretary of commerce was essentially in business with russian oligarchs and putins soninlaw. And he didnt realize that that information was not apparent on the face of these disclosure forms. However, if congress were to clarify and propose and get adopted enhanced disclosure obligations, then someone like e this secretary of commerce and others will have to disclose not just their ownership of llcs but the key customers of those llcs and the financial relationship of those privately held llcs so that both the conflict of interest, many people within the executive branch and congress and the senate will have access to the information that they need. There is one dimension of this, and kathleen, youve written a very eloquently, that there is a temptation every time you have come after watergate instance to have weight of government Ethics Reform, which is why the turn at doj, dont get a drink with someone is going to buy it for you because you might have just run afoul of some rule. And i do think we need to be mindful of the fact that, like ordinary federal employers are already regulated. This is a situation that calls for targeted solutions and thoughtful solutions, and possibly more to do with the machinery of enforcement with oge than it does another wave of Ethics Reform that will impose more restrictions on every lowlevel government employee. And something i really kinky by reading some of your scholarship and i think its an important point we need to keep in mind. So thank you i i want to acknowledge how rare it is for scholarship to any kind of impact at all. [laughing] you know, i have to agree thats a really good point, because for example, we need smart reforms that we dont just need more is more. Right now a staff attorney epa could not go and represent on a pro bono basis a veteran who needs help with the Social Security administration or the va, because theres a criminal conflict of interest statute that extends to the entire government and keeps them from representing people. I have never liked that application. I which it was to adjust your agency or agencies if influence over. I think we have to be careful that the could be a wave of reforms were people just say more is more and they slather on a solution that is like a sledgehammer when a scalpel is needed. Question right here. I really would like to begin by thanking you, really admire the Current Issue and you inspire many of us in the room. My question is really following on somewhat what kathleen said about this whole issue of llcs. Its not just really be llcs that are in the National Disclosure form, the issue where you really cant understand the liability. Wincing articles in Buzzfeed News last week in usa today which really points out that the majority of the Trump Organizations Real Estate Sales have been through these secretive llc companies, especially in the time since he became president. We really dont understand who the true Beneficial Owner is behind these shell companies. We really cant unpack it was trying to buy influence. So in that sense, taking this question, number one, with better disclosure help . And really disclosure enough . Im beginning to think listening to all of you that divesting completely is the answer, given all of these questions. Go ahead. You can start, kathleen. The buzzfeed articles and usa today articles and others, about these transactions really identify the key problem that affects us in terms of government ethics and is a much broader problem. Societywide in the United States. Regarding the lack of transparency, with regard to real estate transactions in particular, not just llcs but the potential for money laundry and so on. I absolutely think we need to be cautious about labeling on additional government ethics standards because more is not always better. I will say that this area, real estate transactions and a lack of transparency with regard to llcs generally, not just with regard to Government Officials, is a really key problem that we need action on. I think thats right. I havent heard any proposals from anyone that would require a company to disclose its customers. Im not even sure theres a proposal out there that would get at this, and yet as you point out its a very serious problem that we dont know who is finally money into the president or for what purpose and are they paying market rate or above market rates or above what the thing is actually worth. This is again goes back to my concern that i dont know that you solve the problem without the vestige or because you for things to flow to a president , particularly through these privately Held Companies. I would be less worried if they held stock in gm and gmo selling off some of its property or assets. I dont know i feel the need to know who theyre selling them off to because its a Big Enough Company data dont think decisions are being made to benefit a president. But these privately Held Companies that he holds or then selling to probably have companies that obscure the buyer, and you already have the articles you mentioned, and i think if people missed it because i didnt see giving as much coverage as you should, a group called Global Witness worked with reuters to release i really damning report on Money Laundering activities. I dont think they ever alleged that he was personally involved in Money Laundering, but that this was going on in these types of businesses seems to be the implication of the report. And now we have a president who is a least adjacent to this activity and makes him vulnerable to blackmail or to funneling money to him, and we have no way of gathering information because these privately Held Companies are not required to disclose it. I just want to ask one more point. Very quickly. There are six bills in congress that address Anonymous Companies so we really need to Pay Attention to the issue. Secondly, i mean, the real estate issue, acquiring real estate, companies in the real estate business, agents or otherwise do due diligence. That doesnt require an act of congress. Very, very quickly. Two things, one is the llc problem is huge. Its central to the Brennan Center, based in new york and the llcs are associative new yorks crisis of corruption. I do believe in transparency and i do think that some combination of transparency rules and recusal rules can be effective. Again i want to come back to not letting the perfect be the enemy of the good. I dont think that transparency is meaningless. I think he can make a big difference. It was my fault for not saying that our questioners should say your name is and also make your one point question. Thanks. My name is bill. I have two question. One is easy. The office of government ethics renders opinions. Are the compulsory or voluntary for those to follow . Can somebody explain the rationale of the gsa decisions that allow the Trump Organization to maintain the tenant agreements at the post Office Department . The first question is a lot easier for the second so i will dive in on that one. Oigs opinions are interpretive, and so its not really a matter of compulsory or noncompulsory. Oge is taking the position that this is what the law means. At least in terms of its legal opinions. It also specious and program advisories where it gives instructions to agencies and it has taken the position that a contract agencies to do things like produce documents or change the way they track things. We recently required them to start using the electronic Financial Disclosure system, unless they the apply for a wao that. But in terms of the legal opinions those are interpretive. Oge court nate with the department of justice when it involves the criminal statutes, and oge cannot bind the department of justice so they could still prosecute somebody. You could talk a prosecutor out of prosecuting probably if you were just to say i relied on ts opinion. So as a practical matter, they have effect of the compulsory because they are your best guidance of what the law is, but again they are not written as orders to go into something. On the gsa question regarding the interpretation of the lease for the trump hotel, the interpretation is nonsensical. [laughing] thats a good one. I would like to knowledge that decision was actually not come interesting, it was not written by emily at gsa, i believe it was written by contracting official. I want to emphasize that the nonsense nonsensibility of it really wouldnt depend on a law degree or in kind of legal education. But on the other hand, i am intrigued by the fact that it wasnt, i mean, im a teacher of legal ethics, so perhaps that reason i am intrigued by fact it wasnt touched or not apparently touched by a lawyer but made by contract officer. It doesnt make any sense because it says the president will not benefit from the lease because he wont action receive the benefit until after he leaves office but to suggest thats not a benefit is as i say nonsensical. I am math illiterate completely but even, finance litter, too. God help me. Even i know what a capital account is a no just because you dont take distributions from your capital account doesnt mean it is not yours still. If the profit sum hotel or going into his capital account, the account is going up and that basically, as kathleen said it was because the money wouldnt actually go out until after he leaves office, he wasnt benefiting. I would add an adjective. Its not only nonsensical, its early. It mocks what it takes as the outside world black and white reading of the very plain language. Just a quick funny story. Before the inauguration gsa was issuing these press statement saying oge decides ethical issues, not us. I get so mad they were sicking the press on his obit is that a call them up and said if you want me to make the decision i will do it today. But unless you give me the authority to make the decision, you stop issuing these press releases that we have control over this outcome because, if i have control over it i know what im going to decide. And they changed their press statement. Go ahead. Thank you for your presentation. Im thinking that ethical role, not only for current president , direct violation [inaudible] unthinking they are [inaudible] outside at the grocer they should be prosecuted, too. I just wonder is there anything in our government [inaudible] they dont prosecute the right person, that means they are benefiting indirectly, so to me its about ethic rule. So is there anything that somewhere people should speak out and say they got to stop . Well, i think your sense of it that this should stop. Unfortunately, or fortunately, its a question between common sense ethics and the legal statutes that create the framework for ethics. And unless theres a a specific criminal law that you violate you cant be prosecuted. Interestingly, this administration itself acknowledged this concept in a letter that omb Mick Mulvaney issued after secretary price lost his job for horsing around on luxury jets. They had a line in there that said just because its legal doesnt mean its right. I almost keeled over laughing because this is what ive been saying to this administration all along and they been telling me i was out of line. At least they heard it well enough to parent it. Just because someone will not be prosecuted doesnt mean the behavior is acceptable. I meant to say this earlier, Something Else, i think it relates with regard to prosecution. One of the areas we have seen the norms breakdown is with the president anything with the department of justice, whether its interviewing u. S. Attorney applicants for the district he has properties in or having the white House Counsel go out and find out if theres a secret fisa warrant or calling for the prosecution of his rivals. Theres a real susceptibility to political influence on prosecution in our country. I think we benefit from this line where you cant be prosecuted just because its wrong. You have to violate the statute. The potential for abuse in the other direction would be terrible because then the president is in charge and he can decide who he doesnt like and have jim acosta cnet prosecuted because he asked hard questions was on everybodys mind. Interestingly though in the early to mid 2000 oge is as paf the International Anticorruption mechanisms and some of them do reviews of each others countries and the feedback oge the u. S. Kept getting was that prosecutors to have enough independence in our country and are too vulnerable to political influence. And at the time it made no sense to me and i thought that sounded crazy. I think we now see what they were talking about with the International Community was expressing concern that the criminal investigative apparatus of our country could be abused for political reasons because of these prosecutors report to political appointees and openly to the president. I think we want to be careful not to go necessarily gone the bounds of law when it comes to imposing punishment but it is intrinsic to many the people of up to the ethical traditions sidle think thats too much to ask. I want to get to the next question. Im a reporter. I wanted to ask are there two sets of rules for the bureaucracy and the widest . Walter, you touched on this, what concerns do you have for how long before sort of way the Trump Administration operates ethically trickles down to say procurement officers or lowerlevel Government Employees . There are two sets of rules but the good news is that i rules that apply to everybody and then there are a few additional rules that apply to the higher level political appointees. While the president and Vice President are exempt, political appointees have all of the normal rules plus some things like a ban on outside income, outside income. So thats okay. I dont think we have this problem except for the president and the Vice President being exempted from statutes. In terms of individual procurement officials, i still have confidence that all of the normal apparatuses in place for the career level employees are so far holding with no indication of change. Workforce of millions of people, you always have the occasional bad egg, so far i havent seen widespread trickle down to the level of violating procurement rules. Part of the reason is you can have bid protest and theres actual Enforcement Mechanisms where the injured parties could hold the government accountable and under a contract. I think that is good. Unfortunately one of the most sinister things out there is this phrase deep state here because what they are calling deep state are people who have a firm belief in the rule of law and the structures in place, to protect the integrity of the government like procurement officials were not going to obey instructions from above to taint procurement but instead of going to insist on the normal rules. If any of you are fans of the office, like Michael Scott complaining about toby being the wet blanket and sang we have rules. So i think that denigrates what actually is one of the best things about our government is that we have people, no matter what is going to follow the rules even if their bosses are pushing otherwise. With record to the Justice Department interms of the emoluments clause. The government has taken up to the Trump Administration, that the foreign emoluments clause prohibits forvalue exchanges between the Government Officials and a Foreign Government. Prohibiting a u. S. Official from receiving compensation for services guided. Limited to governments, the now that the foreign emoluments clause is at issue, it interments the foreign emoluments clause more narrowly that is it has before so it wouldnt apply beforevalue exchange with governments. Thats not just to the president , thats to all federal officials. Just to say that that he will straits illustrates one of the things in our department, the Justice Department is not the best enforcer. You need an ethics regulator for a variety of reasons not just not to the president you get our last question. From the center for justice, im going to pick up on this point because having served at agencies and having witnessed or should i say, having heard of some of these conversations that contracting officers, designated Agency Ethics officials participate in with their bosses, can get uncomfortable, to say the least, at times, and thats one of the reasons im glad you mentioned our private jet hopping cabinet members. I wonder if you think its important and if you thought of additional protections, maybe something along the lines with you mentioned for the director of oge to apply to those folks at executive Branch Agencies to are actually looked upon to approve actions taken by either senior political officers for certify their actions that those officials then use as cover when justifying why they did what they do . Yeah, i think rudys question puts a nice nuance in something i said. In response to your question, i said i dont think its trickle down to the point where procurement decisions are affected. I would say that procurement decisions are the last thing that would be affected because private companies can sue if they get cheated out of a contract that but at the other end of the spectrum, you have rules for which theres no outside oversite and consequence and rudy gave a good example the travel rules have some subjective requirements and career officials and lower level political appointees Work Together to come up with these decisions saying its okay to take the fabulously luxurious charter jet to go the distance from d. C. To philly, the drive to Dulles Airport and the drive to philly, they could have saved money driving you by uber. There i think we have seen some corrupting influence because these people assumed theyd operate in darkness and my group filed an foia request for gsa for the travel reports because all agencies are required to file there and gsa gave the sleaziest response, they said no, you have to request it from each of the agencies, even though we have it all here, and denied the request. It was despicable. And so, i think that these people thought they were going to operate in darkness and then a couple of reporters from politico, they were staking out an airport and caught secretary price and suddenly these decisions are exposed to the public and igs now in two agencies have said the documentation is inadequate and these people just said, oh, yes, i find it meets the standard and they just restated the standard without justifying it. So, i think theres some real danger for that and i even saw a distinction among Agency Ethics among officials where some stood their ground and tried to apply the same standards to these incoming appointees who had gotten a member from their boss that ethics doesnt matter and others came like whatever, i cant think of a good analogy, whatever, and i found myself having to give them pep talks or snarl or bang any fix, whatever i could do to coax, cajole, bully, beg, plead them to hold these to the same standards that they held people in the Bush Administration and people in the Obama Administration because they were so intimidated by a perceived route ruthlessness, and they asked for a list. It would be nice if there were more protections along the line, whistleblower type protections except this isnt quite whistle blowing and i dont have my mind exactly how we would enforce it. One way might be for each individual requirement, create some transparency provisions, at least theyre not operating in darkness. One thing that i proposed to congress, for instance, was just to have gsa post all of these travel reports on its website and require a little bit more information to be put in there, like why did you choose a charter jet as opposed to a first class ticket. So, i think that the key is to look for Enforcement Mechanisms or at least transparency mechanisms. And one of the accountability mechanisms that could come into play here, and i think its important to ensure, is whistleblower protection. Because Government Officials disclosure that such a proposed trip would violate the ethics standards would well qualify for whistleblower protection under the whistleblower protection act and its one thing to look for to make sure that there are protections. That weve actually seen under special council that that continues. And the last word if you want it. The last word, are we yes, we are wrapping up. Okay, so first of all, i want to, again, thank my copanelists for participating in this. I think it was a wonderful discussion. I just building off of that want to end with two things, one is that you know, these issues that have come up with this administration are related, so, whistleblower protections, ethics, limits on president ial power, its important to think of it as a holistic package and one of the things thats going to be a challenge for people in the years ahead is trying to, you know, like the dam that sprouts many leaks, figure out how to tackle sort of the whole, as opposed to various constituent parts. Theres a siloing tendency i think that people are going to have to fight against. The second thing i want to emphasize again, which ive said this is, we at the Brennan Center are committed to the idea that that cant be an enemy of the good. None of these solutions are without drawback. The debate continues and you have to factor in nothing is going to solve all of these problems, but at the same time, you can make progress. And then the last thing, i guess im going to say, is just that again, a lot of this discussion is about President Trump, thats true, but this is theres more our democracy is bigger than any one public official and these are rules with us long after this president is gone and the next president as well. So, the more we can think about whats in our countrys longterm interest and divorce it from anger at what you might perceive as the particular excesses of this administration i think the better. All right. On behalf of the Brennan Center for justice at nyu here in d. C. , id like to thank all of you here in d. C. For joining us live in the audience, as well as those who joined us via live stream or via cspan, and id like to ask those of you who are here to join me in thanking one last time them for this great discussion. [applause] [inaudible conversations] thursday, live on cspan, former secretaries of state Henry Kissinger and George Schultz give the Senate Armed Services committee their takes on u. S. National security strategy. On cspan2, the Senate Returns to consider the nomination for a rd james. And a look at the Postal Services to combat the trafficking of synthetic drugs. And 7 p. M. An event marking the 50th anniversary of the vietnam wars tet offensive. The president of the United States. [applause] tuesday night, President Donald Trump gives his first state of the Union Address to congress and the nation. Join cspan for a preview of the evening starting at 8 00 eastern and then the state of the union speech live at 9 p. M. And following the speech, the democratic response. Well also hear your reaction and comments from members of congress. President trumps state of the Union Address, tuesday night live on cspan. Listen live with the free cspan radio app and available live or on demand on your desk top, phone or tablet at cspan. Org. Next, remarks from pakistans ambassador to the u. S. At this event he said that u. S. Pakistan relations are under stress, but the relationship must be preserved. The center for strategic and International Studies hosted this event. Okay, yeah. So, i hold the chair here at csis. Its a privilege to be hosting this with dr. Jones. We are going to be having