Last updated on July 17th, 2023 at 09:34 pm
Is there any way to stop Donald Trump from plundering the USA? If Congressional Republicans have any integrity at all, now that they’ve established themselves as head witch-hunters in charge, they will.
As anyone with one eye half open during the primary campaign could see, President-elect Donald Trump’s slogan of draining the swamp was a rather vulgar way of offering his masses cover to support him. No one took that seriously, after all Donald Trump refused to release his tax returns.
Trump was never going to drain the swamp; he was always going to do the opposite. That is why he spent the entire campaign calling his opponent former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton “corrupt”. Because now when it’s used accurately used against him, it will have no bite.
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The question now is who will save us from the potential sell-off of America to foreign interests. On matters of national security, it seems possible that Republicans Senators Lindsey Graham and John McCain could save us. They have both spoken out, Graham about an inquiry into the possible foreign hacking of our election via the emails and McCain against Trump’s unwillingness to rule out torture.
But on matters of Trump’s corruption for his own financial gain even if it causes a conflict of interest with what is best for the United States, Republicans don’t seem likely to do much for us.
Jason Easley of PoliticusUSA suggested in light of Trump’s obvious conflicts of interest, “Congress should immediately pass legislation requiring all presidents to sell off or seal themselves off from personal business holdings before assuming office… If Donald Trump uses the presidency for personal and family enrichment, because Congress did nothing to stop him, the Republican majority will reveal itself to as corrupt as the man in the White House.”
The pressure has to come now, or Republicans will play this off as if they had no clue when Trump turns out to be worse than Nixon, and by all indications, that will happen.
Greg Sargent at the Washington Post suggested two things Congressional Republicans could do to show they have some concern for the Trump ethical problems already lining up like sturdy soldiers of war against America.
A realistic (that is, not optimistic) Sargent laid out two specific steps congressional Republicans could take (more details at the link above):
1) Republicans could demand that Trump and his family produce a full and complete accounting of what his business empire’s interests entail.
2) Codifying the tradition of presidential candidates — and presidents — releasing their tax returns.
As enticement for a transparency reticent Trump, Sargent noted Jeff Hauser’s, of the Revolving Door Project, suggestion that Senate Republicans could withhold support for Trump nominees until he plays ball.
Of course no one is optimistic that Congressional Republicans will continue their “concern” about ethics and conflicts of interest now, so long as a Trump presidency is working for the Republican agenda.
This will leave it to the press, which is kind of terrifying. The print and digital press seem very inclined to go searching and press the issue, but it is the networks and cable TV outlets that have thus far seemed a bit too happy to cash in on a Trump presidency, even when his foreign interests are already, before he’s even moved into the White House, alarming those who are paying attention.
After the Washington Post revealed that Trump launched deals with foreign entities during his candidacy “that are tied to a hotel project in Saudi Arabia, which Trump has vowed to protect militarily.”
And Talking Points Memo’s Josh Marshall flagged a report showing that when the Argentine President called Trump to congratulate him on his win, Trump responded by pressuring him to expedite permits for Trump projects that are currently being delayed.
The conflicts of interest are everywhere for Donald Trump. Republicans just spent years investigating every word written by Hillary Clinton, thanks to their use of many Benghazi investigations to justify an investigation into her emails, and then a big assist from Wikileaks and Russia via the hacking of the DNC.
Those investigations were obviously political, but they did set a standard. If Republicans turn the other way as Trump plunders the USA, they will be tarnished with his stain for a good long time.
Update: Nick Miroff suggests, “Lanata said Trump Macri story was ‘half-joking, half-serious’ when he introduced on his program last night.”
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Sarah has been credentialed to cover President Barack Obama, then VP Joe Biden, 2016 Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, and exclusively interviewed Speaker Nancy Pelosi multiple times and exclusively covered her first home appearance after the first impeachment of then President Donald Trump.
Sarah is two-time Telly award winning video producer and a member of the Society of Professional Journalists.
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