A swamp? Lobbyists getting ethics waivers
Many regulating industries they once worked for
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump and his appointees have stocked federal agencies with ex-lobbyists and corporate lawyers who now help regulate the very industries from which they previously collected paychecks, despite Trump's promises as a candidate to drain the swamp in Washington.
A week after his inauguration, Trump signed an executive order that bars former lobbyists, lawyers and others from participating in any matter they worked on for private clients within two years of going to work for the government.
But records reviewed by the Associated Press show Trump's top lawyer, White House counsel Don McGahn, has issued at least 37 ethics waivers to key administration officials at the White House and executive branch agencies.
Though the waivers were typically issued months ago, the Office of Government Ethics disclosed several more this week. The White House had previously released more than a dozen waivers granted to its staff.
One allows FBI Director Chris Wray “to participate in matters involving a confidential former client.” The three-sentence waiver gives no indication about what Wray's conflict of interest might be. The FBI did not respond to a request for comment on Thursday.
Before returning to the Justice Department last year, Wray represented clients that included big banks and other corporations as a partner at a law firm that paid him $9.2 million a year, according to his financial disclosure statement.
Trump's executive order on ethics supplanted more stringent ules put in place by President Barack Obama in 2009 to avoid conflicts of interests. Nearly 70 waivers were issued to executive branch officials in Obama's eight years, though those were generally more narrowly focused and offered a fuller explanation for why the waiver was granted.
Craig Holman, who lobbies in Washington for stricter government ethics and lobbying rules on behalf of the advocacy group Public Citizen, said just five of the waivers under Obama went to former lobbyists, most of whom had worked for nonprofit groups.
Although he was initially optimistic when Trump issued his executive order, Holman said, “It is now quite evident that the pledge was little more than campaign rhetoric. Not only are key provisions simply ignored and not enforced, when in cases where obvious conflicts of interest are brought into the limelight, the administration readily issues waivers from the ethics rules.”
Asked about the waivers, Lindsay Walters, a White House spokeswoman, said, “In the interests of full transparency and good governance, the posted waivers set forth the policy reasons for granting an exception to the pledge.”
An analysis by the AP shows that nearly half of the political appointees hired at the Environmental Protection Agency under Trump have strong industry ties. Of 59 EPA hires tracked by the AP over the last year, about a third worked as registered lobbyists or lawyers for chemical manufacturers, fossil fuel producers or other corporate clients.
Most of those officials have signed ethics agreements saying they would not participate in actions involving their former clients while working at the EPA. At least three have gotten waivers allowing them to do just that.