Elizabeth Warren is touting a legislative win aimed that includes implicit criticism of President Trump: an ethics crackdown on presidential transition teams.
The senator for Massachusetts and 2020 Democratic presidential candidate on Monday marked the Senate’s recent passage of a bill calling for White House hopefuls to release transition team ethics plans. Those documents would have to deal with how they’ll address conflicts of interest if they win the general election.
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“For me, this comes down to one central question: who does this government work for? Is it going to continue to work for a thinner and thinner slice at the top, or are we going to make this government work for the rest of America?” Warren, a frequent political foil of Trump’s, said in a statement.
The proposal, passed by the Senate last week, also would require the signing of enforceable codes of conduct to ban transition team members from working on projects related to their own financial interests. The federal government provides transition teams with funding and access to other government resources to nominees of both major parties. But team members have traditionally skirted ethics laws because they’re not considered to be federal employees.
The Trump transition team, led by then-Vice President-elect Mike Pence, was criticized for its disorganization and problematic financial entanglements. Bijan Kian, a onetime business partner of former national security adviser Michael Flynn and transition team member, was convicted last month of illegally conducting pro-Turkish government lobbying work before the 2016 election. The charges stemmed from special counsel Robert Mueller’s federal Russia investigation.
Presidential Transition Enhancement Act of 2019 will be considered by the House when Congress returns after the August recess.
