Ethics Lawyers Call for Delay to Confirmation Hearings

Norman Eisen and Richard Painter, White House ethics lawyers for Obama and Bush, respectively:

The tone of ethical leadership and conduct is set at the top. The failure of Trump as president-elect to address the conflicts of interest and constitutional problems deriving from his own business interests is a serious problem.

Last week, there was a failed attempt by some congressional Republicans to gut the Office of Congressional Ethics (President-elect Trump rightly dressed them down for that – on Twitter of course – and they quickly backed down). This week the serious and independent work of the Office of Government Ethics appears to be in jeopardy unless the Senate slows down and insists that each nominee take both financial disclosure and ethics agreements seriously.

To preserve the integrity of the ethics review process, we urge Senate leadership to postpone any confirmation hearing unless the nominee’s financial disclosure reports and ethics agreements are finalized in advance.