Republicans are already making it clear: Trump can do whatever he wants
Republicans are already making it clear: Trump can do whatever he wants
By Paul Waldman December 5 at 1:19 PM
We’ve never had a president whose business created as many potential conflicts of interest as Donald Trump, and at the same time we’ve never had a president who cared less about conflicts of interest as Donald Trump. Indeed, he and his children are making it quite clear that they will use the presidency as a tool to make as much money as they can.
Indeed, the GOP is so easily dismissing Democratic threats of investigations and ethicists’ calls for divestment out of a belief that the political landscape has shifted. Voters rewarded Trump in part on the idea that success in business will equal success in government, and Republicans are therefore unwilling to encourage the president-elect to put distance between the Oval Office and Trump Tower, or between himself and the children who serve him as trusted advisers.
“This is a great test case between the pre-Trump and post-Trump worlds,” said former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, a prominent early GOP backer of the president-elect. “In a pre-Trump world dominated by left-wing ideas, anyone successful is inherently dangerous and should be punished for trying to serve the country.”
“The American people,” Gingrich added, “knowingly voted for a businessman whose name is inextricably tied to his fortune. … I’d say to the left wing, get over it.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2016/12/05/republicans-are-already-making-it-clear-trump-can-do-whatever-he-wants/?hpid=hp_no-name_opinion-card-f%3Ahomepage%2Fstory&utm_term=.4d816d92b558
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