The White House denies pushing to allow anonymous donor including lobbyists to fund lawyers for White House staff, but critics fear elimination of a one-sentence disclaimer may make it possible.
No outside funds have been set up yet for staff, but they may be soon as special counsel Robert Mueller seeks interviews as part of his probe into Russia’s role in the 2016 election.
As last seen during the Bill Clinton presidency, legal bills can add up fast for White House workers facing questioning, even if they are not suspected of wrongdoing.
The current concern centers on a long-ignored but never rescinded 1993 legal opinion that said donors to outside legal funds should be kept secret to ensure a recipient “does not know who the paymasters are.”
Since the mid-1990s, the Office of Government Ethics ignored this opinion and instead required legal defense funds to regularly disclosure donors, determining transparency a better approach. The internal policy also bans contributions from people with conflicts of interest.
To ensure the status quo remained, OGE director Walter Shaub in May ordered a disclaimer attached to the office’s 1993 legal opinion, saying in all caps that it was invalid.
After Shaub’s resignation, the disclaimer was modified to say the opinion remains in effect.
“It’s unseemly for the ethics office to be doing something sneaky like that,” Shaub told Politico, which first reported the issue.
Adding confusion, White House spokeswoman Lindsay Walters did not explain the modification but called concern “another example of Walter Shaub — who has no direct knowledge of anything the White House is doing or assisting with — trying to make himself feel relevant.”
An unnamed White House aide told Politico the White House is not pushing to allow anonymous donations or helping set up outside legal funds, but is interested in identifying ways donors to legal funds could be disclosed, with lobbyists barred from donating.
OGE has not explained why it modified the May disclaimer, resulting in continued confusion about what if anything the change will mean.
The office did not respond to requests for comment, nor did spokeswomen for the White House.
Norman Eisen, President Barack Obama’s special assistant for ethics and government reform from 2009 to 2011, told the Washington Examiner “I welcome the White House statements” that it’s not pushing to allow anonymous donations.
But Eisen, who was nicknamed “ethics czar,” said more clarity is needed.
“I think OGE should resolve the controversy and confusion about all this by explicitly and publicly reaffirming its long-standing practice banning such contributions to legal defense funds,” he said. “Ethics best practices demand nothing less.”
Marilyn Glynn, who worked nearly two decades at OGE, including as its acting director in the early 2000s, recalled ethics staff deciding the 1993 opinion was impractical in combatting the appearance of corruption.
The 1993 opinion “might let in people who have something to gain by currying favor with the government,” she said. “So we went in the opposite direction.”
As White House staff faced questions about President Bill Clinton’s relations with Monica Lewinsky, Glynn said OGE decided disclosure was the best approach.
“How do you even enforce anonymity?” Glynn said, noting rumors, leaks and speculation would be rampant if anonymity were allowed or enforced.
The matter of outside funds for still-serving White House staff has not been subject of intense public scrutiny since the Clinton years, so the status quo hasn’t been the focus of much debate.
Glynn said that although the issue of donations can be contentious, potential beneficiaries of White House legal funds may be viewed with public sympathy, as they generally are not targets themselves of an investigation.
“By being in the wrong place at the wrong time they have been hit by these potentially enormous bills,” she said. “It’s a very sympathetic situation: secretaries, assistants, people like that all of a sudden are being asked what they know. And they need lawyers too to make sure they do not inadvertently wind up saying something that indicates some intent on their part.”
Shaub, now working at the Campaign Legal Center, blasted the OGE in a statement Thursday, but expressed satisfaction that “the White House was forced to concede last night that anonymous donations are inappropriate.”
“It’s a shame that OGE’s acting director took us down this road, and it’s an even greater shame that the White House is handling OGE’s media relations on this critical issue, given the importance of OGE remaining independent from the White House and serving as the ethics watchdog for the executive branch, not the White House Counsel’s lapdog,” he said.
