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Fearing More 'Blatant Corruption' in Second Trump Term, Watchdog Issues Ethics Blueprint
"Should the flagrant disregard of ethics rules return, the political opposition must use all tools at their disposal to advance ethics reforms and neutralize as much harm as possible."
Oct 31, 2024
A leading U.S. watchdog group on Thursday published what it called "a blueprint for strengthening the federal government's ethics programs across the executive, legislative, and judicial branches" amid Democrats' inadequate reforms and the prospect of more "outright scandals and blatant corruption" under a possible second administration of former Republican President Donald Trump.
The Revolving Door Project publication—titled Rebuilding Public Trust: Six Principles to Guide Reform—notes that "Americans' trust in government is near historic lows, a trend that both preceded and continued after the blatant corruption of the Trump administration."
"Democratic administrations, too, made limited progress in curtailing the more routine forms of corruption that combine with dramatic scandals to undercut public trust," the report continues, adding that President Joe Biden's 2021 executive order on ethics "was only a modest step up on what has been standard, failing to take the large strides necessary to close the revolving door between private and public sectors, mandate divestitures, or require compliance with stringent transparency measures."
"The next administration will be a crucial test of ethical management of the federal government."
"Congressional Democrats' reform proposals have also stopped short of addressing mundane corruption, even as many Democrats have been implicated in congressional trading scandals and leaders like Nancy Pelosi have expressed disdain for commonsense measures like banning congressional stock trading," the paper asserts, referring to the House speaker emeritus from California.
"The Supreme Court and federal judiciary have been swamped by ethics scandals, with investigative reporting exposing judges' and justices' failures to disclose lavish trips from wealthy backers and failures to recuse in cases involving their financial interests—yet some mainstream judicial ethics proposals stop short of even holding the judiciary to the same ethics standards as Congress," the report adds.
The publication enumerates "six principles that should guide ethics reform efforts":
- Practices that can be plausibly perceived as corrupt must be outlawed;
- Successful ethics program will consist of bright-line rules that are simple to administer and enforce;
- Ethics rules should be as comprehensive as possible in both who and what they cover;
- Ethics rules should distinguish between corporate lobbying that serves private interests, and lobbying by public interest groups;
- Ethics offices must have the legal authority, independence, and resources to find and investigate breaches and hold powerful actors accountable; and
- The ethics system, no matter how strong, must proactively invite public scrutiny, not cower from it.
"By slowing the turn of the revolving door and banning all political appointees, federal judges, Supreme Court justices, and members of Congress from owning individual stocks, the next administration and Congress could make huge strides in rebuilding Americans' trust that the government works in the public interest, not corporate interests," Revolving Door Project research director and report co-author Andrea Beaty said in a statement Thursday. "And our recommendations to promote transparency and strong enforcement would work to cement such advances."
Trump—whose first term was marred by thousands of conflicts of interest and many other alleged and proven improprieties—is already one of the most conflicted presidents in U.S. history, given his business connections with foreign governments and holdings in industries governed by federal regulators.
Earlier this month, Democrats on the House Oversight and Accountability Committee published a report detailing how, while in office, the former president used his Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C. to enrich himself with hundreds of illegal or questionable payments from federal and state officials, job-seekers, and presidential pardon recipients.
"With Trump unabashedly previewing a return to blatant corruption and Americans in a period of near-historically low trust in government, the next administration will be a crucial test of ethical management of the federal government," Revolving Door Project executive director Jeff Hauser said in a statement.
"Unless the next administration prioritizes robust ethics reforms, trust in government institutions will erode further," he added. "And should the flagrant disregard of ethics rules return, the political opposition must use all tools at their disposal to advance ethics reforms and neutralize as much harm as possible."
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A Navy Admiral’s Bribery Charges Are Just Part of a System of Corrupt Dealings
It’s great that our legal system is seeking to hold law breakers to account, but when will members of Congress who place shilling for special interests above crafting an effective defense policy face the music?
Jun 09, 2024
The indictment of four-star Navy Admiral Robert Burke on bribery charges late last month raised eyebrows about the extent of corruption in the Navy and beyond. The scheme was simple. Burke allegedly steered a $355,000 Pentagon contract to a small workforce training firm—described unhelpfully in the Justice Department’s description as “Company A." Less than a year later he took a job at Company A in exchange for a $500,000 annual salary and 100,000 stock options.
The Burke indictment comes on the heels of Washington Post writer Craig Whitlock’s illuminating book on the Fat Leonard Scandal, the biggest, most embarrassing corruption scheme in the history of the U.S. Navy. In the words of his publisher, Simon Schuster, Whitlock’s book reveals “how a charismatic Malaysian defense contractor bribed scores of high-ranking military officers, defrauded the U.S. Navy of tens of millions of dollars, and jeopardized our nation’s security.”
Obviously, the Navy needs to clean up its act, and, if found guilty, Burke should face consequences for his participation in a blatant case of old school corruption.
If skipping a serious conversation on the future nuclear policy of the United States to engage in pork barrel politics isn’t a case of blatant corruption and dereliction of duty, what is?
But this is just part of a pernicious system of corrupt dealings and profiteering in Pentagon procurement practices, and much of it is completely legal. It involves campaign contributions from major weapons contractors to key members of Congress with the most power to determine the size and shape of the Pentagon budget, and job blackmail, in which companies place facilities in as many congressional districts as possible and then stand ready to accuse members of cutting local jobs if they vote against a weapons program, no matter how misguided or dysfunctional it may be.
It also involves the revolving door, in which arms industry executives often do stints in top national security posts, even serving as secretary of defense, or, on the other side of the revolving door, when high ranking Pentagon and military officials go to work for weapons makers when they leave government service.
In fact, this is, by far, the most common path for retired senior military officers. As a Quincy Institute analysis found, over 80% of four-star generals and admirals that have retired in the last five years (26 of 32) went on to work in the arms sector. In short, most retiring four-stars, like Burke, go on to lucrative positions in the arms industry. Unlike Burke, they follow the rules, so this is all perfectly legal corruption.
The revolving door from the Pentagon is also spinning feverishly to foreign governments. A Washington Postinvestigation found that more than 500 former Pentagon personnel, including many high-ranking generals and admirals, have gone on to work for foreign governments known for political repression and human rights abuses, like Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
Last, but certainly not least, there are the lobbyists. Last year alone, Pentagon contractors spent nearly $138 million on lobbying and had 905 lobbyists working on their behalf, according to OpenSecrets. That’s almost two lobbyists for every member of Congress, and more than 600 of them had gone through the revolving door—previously working at the Pentagon, Congress, or the Executive branch.
All of the above is about money and jobs, not crafting an effective defense strategy or buying weapons systems that are appropriate for carrying out that strategy. A case in point was a hearing last October to review a report on America’s strategic (meaning nuclear) posture from a congressional commission, almost all the members of which have financial ties to the arms industry.
First off, the commission co-chair who testified at the hearing was former Arizona Senator Jon Kyl, a lifelong opponent of nuclear arms control who also did a stint as a lobbyist for Northrop Grumman, which makes nuclear bombers and land-based nuclear missiles. Surprise, surprise, Kyl recommended that Congress pony up more for nuclear weapons on top of the Pentagon’s current $2 trillion, three decades long nuclear weapons “modernization” program.
But surely the gathered members of the Senate Armed Services Committee would ask some tough questions before accepting the commission’s proposals for an accelerated nuclear buildup. Think again. The bulk of the questioners essentially touted nuclear-related missiles or facilities in their states and asked a variation on the penetrating question, “Shouldn’t we spend more on this wonderful weapon [or facility] in my state?”
What wasn’t mentioned at the hearing was the fact that defense contractors—including Northrop Grumman, which makes the nuclear weapons in question—are some of the top campaign contributors to members of the committee, according to OpenSecrets.
It fell to Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) to bring the discussion down to Earth by asking how much the commission’s ambitious plan would cost. With a straight face, Kyl said that the commission hadn’t calculated a cost, since the investments proposed were so urgently needed. This seems highly unlikely given that the United States already deploys over 1,700 nuclear warheads that can hit targets thousands of miles away, with thousands more in reserve.
But Kyl’s statement went largely unchallenged in the rush by members to flak for their local weapons of choice.
If skipping a serious conversation on the future nuclear policy of the United States to engage in pork barrel politics isn’t a case of blatant corruption and dereliction of duty, what is? If even a conversation that touches on the future of the planet can’t rouse money-conscious senators to engage in an actual debate, what will? And isn’t this dereliction of duty ultimately more dangerous than trading cash or a cushy job for doing the bidding of a weapons contractor?
It’s great that our legal system is seeking to hold participants in illegal schemes to account. But when will members of Congress who place shilling for special interests above crafting an effective defense policy face the music? If not soon, we can expect much of the tens or hundreds of billions of new money likely to be thrown at the Pentagon in the next few years to go to waste. If that’s not a scandal of the highest order, we don’t know what is.
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What's Scarier Than Unchecked AI? A 'Swarm' of 3,400 Corporate AI Lobbyists
"Either we let corporate lobbyists write rules on AI to concentrate corporate power and wealth, or we demand that government officials prioritize the public interest."
May 29, 2024
Dozens of legislative proposals aiming to regulate artificial intelligence have been introduced since the beginning of the 118th Congress early last year, and industries and corporations that plan to expand their use of AI have taken notice—more than doubling the number of lobbyists they sent to Capitol Hill in 2023 to influence lawmakers on AI-related issues, compared to the previous year.
That's according to an analysis by consumer advocacy group Public Citizen, which warned in its report published Wednesday that "powerful corporate interests are pouring resources into shaping AI policy."
Public Citizen examined lobbying disclosure records from 2019-23, and found that corporations, trade groups, and other organizations deployed more than 3,400 AI lobbyists to influence federal lawmakers last year—a 120% jump from 2022.
The number of organizations that lobbied the government on AI-related matters was relatively steady from 2019-22, but the new analysis shows that last year corporations, trade groups, and lobbying firms appeared to view AI as an issue that required more focus, with 566 clients lobbying on AI—a 108% increase from the 272 organizations engaged on the issue in 2022.
"AI guardrails are essential to protect the public and the voices of stakeholders that represent them must also be heard loudly in the halls of government."
The number of lobbyists who lobbied White House officials also rose significantly over the course of last year, as the Biden administration prepared to release its landmark executive order to require the "safe, secure, and trustworthy development and use" of AI in October.
In the first quarter of 2023, 323 lobbyists were hired to lobby the White House on AI-related issues, and that number jumped 188% by the end of the year, when 931 lobbyists were working to influence top Biden administration officials.
Eighty-five percent of lobbyists hired in 2023 to focus on AI-related lobbying were hired by corporations or corporate trade groups, Public Citizen found.
"Corporate lobbyists running amok in the halls of Congress and the halls of power are aiming to set our AI future," said Robert Weissman, president of the group. "Either we let corporate lobbyists write rules on AI to concentrate corporate power and wealth, or we demand that government officials prioritize the public interest."
The analysis noted that while the tech industry was the most active in AI lobbying last year, it only accounted for 20% of AI-focused influencing efforts by powerful interests. Corporate groups and other organizations promoting education, transportation, healthcare, defense, media, and financial services were also among those that ramped up their AI lobbying last year.
Shortly after President Joe Biden unveiled his executive order last year, House Democrats raised alarm about the use of AI by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services to determine and deny payment for patients who have Medicare Advantage plans, underscoring how a wide range of industries have begun using the technology to boost their profits at the expense of the public.
The Chamber of Commerce hired the most lobbyists to press lawmakers and other officials on AI issues last year, with 81 new hires tasked with influencing AI-related legislation and federal restrictions. The Business Roundtable, American Property Casualty Insurance Association, and General Motors were also among the clients that hired the most AI lobbyists in 2023.
"AI companies, defense contractors, autonomous vehicle manufacturers, and others stand to make billions if AI policy is crafted more in their interest than in the public's," said Mike Tanglis, research director for Public Citizen's Congress Watch division. "They appear to be dominating the AI focused conversations on Capitol Hill. It's never a good idea to put the fox in charge of designing henhouse security."
The lobbying surge came as lawmakers introduced legislation including the AI Accountability Act, aimed at providing "assurance that AI systems used by communications networks are trustworthy"; the REAL Political Advertisements Act, which would demand transparency about the use of generative AI content in political ads; and the DEEPFAKES Accountability Act, which would create disclosure requirements for producing "advanced technological false personation" records.
"We're reaching a point where the policies that are going to shape AI policy in the next 10 years are really being decided now," Tanglis toldThe Hill. "From our perspective, having the leading voices on an issue being those that stand to make billions of dollars is generally not a good idea for the public."
Public Citizen projected that the AI lobbying blitz will continue throughout 2024 and beyond, as federal agencies are tasked with introducing new regulations and rules to ensure that AI is used with transparency and accountability.
Following Biden's executive order last year, the Commerce Department started requiring AI developers whose models pose national security risks to disclose safety test results and other information, and the Department of Health and Human Services convened a task force to explore AI regulations and governance.
With the federal government taking action to erect guardrails for the use of AI, said Public Citizen, "stakeholders will likely rely even more on their lobbyists to shape how AI policy is formed."
"The U.S. federal government should remain wary of corporate interest engagement with the process," said the group. "AI guardrails are essential to protect the public and the voices of stakeholders that represent them must also be heard loudly in the halls of government."
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