<\/a>Experts in the field of government ethics apparently had to restrain themselves from laughing out loud at Donald Trump\u2019s conflict of interest plan, as he assumes the office of President of the United States. Trump\u2019s lawyer, Sherri Dillon, outlined the plan at Trump\u2019s Jan. 11 press conference.<\/p>\n When it came time for this important announcement, rather than try to explain it himself, Trump turned the podium over to Dillon. He stated<\/a> that Dillon has designed a structure \u201cthat will completely isolate him\u201d from the management of his company.<\/p>\n Dillon proceeded to defend the plan she was about to announce by arguing that: It would be too hard to sell Trump\u2019s assets; that a sale of assets wouldn\u2019t be fair to Trump because he wouldn\u2019t get a fair price; that there\u2019s no one outside of Trump\u2019s family who knows enough or could be trusted enough to run a blind trust; that a sale would entail taking on third-party debt\u2014possibly from foreign countries; and that the whole thing wouldn\u2019t work, anyway.<\/p>\n Based on all of these excuses, Dillon outlined the plan that Trump intends to implement. According to Dillon:<\/a><\/p>\n Trump is conveying leadership and management of the company to his adult sons and longtime Trump executive Allen Weisselberg. Dillon said the three will “make decisions for the duration of the presidency without any involvement whatsoever” by Trump.<\/p>\n Dillon also said the trust agreement “imposes severe restrictions on new deals. No new foreign deals will be made whatsoever during the duration” of Trump’s presidency. New domestic deals will be allowed, but they will go through “a vigorous vetting process.”<\/p>\n Trump will not be informed of such deals and will only learn of them if he “reads it in the paper or sees it on TV.”<\/p>\n And, she said, Trump will donate to the U.S Treasury all profits made from foreign governments who stay at his hotel.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Almost immediately, government ethics lawyers reacted negatively. Basically, they said, the plan fails the giggle test.<\/p>\n On the PBS News Hour<\/a>, Norman Eisen, former special counsel to President Obama gave this analysis to host Steve Inskeep:<\/p>\n INSKEEP: The president-elect suggests he is going above and beyond. Is he?<\/p>\n EISEN [appearing to be holding back laughter]: No. He\u2019s going beneath and below the minimum floor that\u2019s required by law, that\u2019s required by our most fundamental law, the Constitution, that is established by what every president for four decades has done, that ethics require and that common sense requires, Steve.<\/p>\n This was a sad day. I wasn\u2019t happy to see what happened here.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n More specifically, Inskeep asked Eisen about Trump\u2019s refusal to create a blind trust for his assets:<\/p>\n STEVE INSKEEP:\u00a0 Is she [Trump\u2019s lawyer, Sherri Dillon<\/em>] right that a blind trust isn\u2019t going to work?<\/p>\n NORMAN EISEN: No, she\u2019s wrong…<\/p>\n On the first point, if it\u2019s a problem that he would still know things in a blind trust, how much more of a problem is it now, where he has this completely unprecedented continuing ownership interest, and very weak protections that were outlined today for communications between and among his sons? Does anybody really believe that they\u2019re not going to be talking about the business?<\/p>\n Then, number two, it actually would be simple to do this. All Trump needs to do \u2014 this is not complicated \u2014 find an independent professional trustee. There are plenty out there who have dealt with far more complications. This is \u2014 the Trump Organization is just a big international family business.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n During the same News Hour segment, Inskeep consulted with Richard W. Painter, who was the chief White House lawyer from 2005 to 2007.<\/p>\n INSKEEP: What is wrong with turning over management of the company to his sons, who it is said will act independently of him?<\/p>\n PAINTER: Well, he will still own the company.<\/p>\n And the problem is the company, the Trump Organization, has business deals all over the world. And some may be getting turned down, although some might get accepted. There are already deals in place. There are deals with powerful politicians in Indonesia, with oligarchs in the Philippines, deals in Turkey.<\/p>\n I mean, these are parts of the world where there\u2019s very important issues to be dealt with on behalf of the United States and strategic concerns. We can\u2019t have the president have substantial economic exposure himself in these countries and business partners who may be in league with foreign governments.<\/p>\n This is an enormous conflict of interests. We also have\u00a0 the president\u2019s name being on buildings around the world in places where it\u2019s questionable whether these other countries can protect those buildings.<\/p>\n …That\u2019s going to be jeopardizing the lives of the people who live in those buildings and could drag the United States into a conflict. That\u2019s only the beginnings of the problems.<\/p>\n We have potential mixing Trump business with United States government business. And that would trigger a bribery investigation. And then we, of course, have those payments coming in from foreign governments and companies controlled by foreign governments that violate the Constitution, unless they sweep all of those out of the Trump Organization as of January 20…<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Even before the official announcement, Painter and Eisen issued a five-point checklist against which to measure Trump\u2019s plan. Their checklist asks the following questions. [Read full explanation of the conflict-of-interest test here<\/a>.]<\/p>\n The answers, according to Painter and Eisen are no, no, no, no and no. Trump\u2019s plan fails on all counts.<\/p>\n In addition, Walter Shaub Jr., the current director of the Office of Government Ethics, has severely criticized Trump\u2019s plan. According to a transcript<\/a> of Shaub’s prepared remarks posted on the Brookings Institution website, he called Trump’s plan to “limit direct communication” about the business “wholly inadequate.”<\/p>\n The plan the [President-elect] has announced doesn\u2019t meet the standards that the best of his nominees are meeting and that every president in the last four decades have met,\u201d Shaub said. \u201cWe can\u2019t risk the perception that government leaders would use their official positions for professional profit.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n