By Eric Tucker, Michelle L. Price and Zeke Miller
WASHINGTON (AP) – In the first three weeks of his administration, President Donald Trump moved with brutal haste to dismantle the public integrity of the federal government that he often tested during his first term and now seems to be the intention to completely remove.
In a time span on Monday, it was reported that he had forced leaders From offices responsible for the complaints of government ethics and whistleblowers. And in a blessing for companies, he ordered a break at the enforcement of a decades of old law that prohibits American companies from paying bribes to win things abroad. All that came at the top of the earlier late-night purification of More than a dozen inspectors general who are charged with eradicating waste, fraud and abuse at government agencies.
It is all done with a stop-me-you-dare defiance by a president who first time around by watchdogs, lawyers and judges who are responsible for confirming a good government and fair play. Now he seems determined to break those limitations once and for all in a historically unprecedented flex of executive power.
“It is the most corrupt start we have ever seen in the history of the American presidency,” said Standard requirements, a former American ambassador in the Czech Republic who was a legal adviser to Democrats during Trump’s first accusation.
“The final goal is to avoid responsibility this time,” said Princeton University President historian Julian Zelizer. “Not only being protected by his party and the arithmetic on the public to continue when scandals or problems arise, but this time by actually removing many of the key figures whose task it is to supervise”, his administration .
Zelizer added: “It is a much more brave statement than in its first term, and if successful and if all these figures are removed, you have a combination of an executive branch with independent voices that keep an eye on the ball and then one Congress majority that at least so far will not really cause problems for him. “
To a certain extent, Trump’s early actions reflect a continuation of the path he has burned in his first term, when He rejected several important inspectors -general – including those who lead the Ministry of Defense and the intelligence community – and fired an FBI director And An attorney general In the midst of an investigation into the Ministry of Justice into his ties between his presidential campaign 2016 and Russia.
This time, however, his administration was moved much faster in reprisals against those he has previously done injustice – whether that could still be done.
His Ministry of Justice last month more than a dozen public prosecutors fired in two separate investigations -The one in his hammering of classified documents, the other in his efforts to undo the 2020 presidential elections resulted in, since then persecuted charges after he left his office. It is too demanded a list of all agents who participated in investigations with regard to the January 6, 2021 Riot in Capitol, USAWith Trump who says on Friday that he is planning to fire some quickly and ‘surgically’.
The actions reflect the intention of the administration to maintain the Ministry of Justice and even purify researchers from researchers who are considered insufficiently loyal, although career officials are usually not replaced by new presidents. Trump’s actions are in accordance with the dramatic dismissal on his first Friday evening in function of Almost 20 inspectors General in a wide cross -sectional From government agencies, all in apparent violation of a law that requires the congress to receive a 30-day prior notice of such dismissals.
The last movements came on Monday, when the recently dismissed head of the Office of Special Counsel, which processes whistleblower complaints and processes the Hatch Act that forbids federal employees to have partisan activities at work, his resignation days earlier. Trump separately dismissed the head of the office of government ethics.
Trump’s administration also wiped out two high -profile public integrity cases of chosen officials on Monday. Trump Grace Former Illinois Gov. Rod BlagojevichHe was convicted of political corruption decisions that include to sell an appointment to the old senate chair of the then President Barack Obama. Hours later, the Ministry of Justice of Trump ordered federal prosecutors to drop charges Against Mayor Eric Adams from New York, who was accused of accepting bribes of free or discount on travel and illegal campaign contributions.
“I think Trump has sent an unmistakable message that corruption is welcome in his new administration,” said demands, who now works with State Democracy Defenders Fund, a non -profit Watchdog Group that says that it is fighting “election sabotage and autocracy” lawsuits against Trump’s government.
“Together these actions will streamlines all efforts that he and his administration make to personally benefit, to install loyalists and prevent monitoring of corruption and waste,” Washington, said in a statement. “According to all instructions, Trump plans to run a lawless administration and these unprecedented movements are an alarming first step to take those plans into action.”
Trump has depicted things in the same way as he labels his own studies: as a politically motivated witch yachts.
Trump, who campaigned in 2016 on a promise to remove Washington from corruption with his “drainage”, has also focused on ethics and watchdog rules when it comes to things. On Monday he paused the enforcement of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, a 1977 law that prevents American companies from paying bribes to foreign government officials to win things until the new attorney -general PAM Bondi can design new rules.
The White House said that the action was needed because American companies “is forbidden to deal with practices that are common in international competitors, creating an uneven playing field.”
“It sounds good on paper, but in practicality it is a disaster,” Trump said in the White House.
On his first day at the office last month, Trump signed an executive order that a subdued of a published by former President Joe Biden who had forbidden employees of the executive power to accept large gifts from lobbyists and to ban people from lobbying to jobs of the executive be power, or the opposite, for two years. The forbidden were aimed at curbing the “rotating door” in Washington, where incoming government workers could bring a minefield of ethical conflicts and later find lobby courts.
The move came when Trump returned with new overlaps between his personal and business interests, including his launch of a new cryptocurrency -token.
His family business, the Trump organization, has meanwhile accepted a voluntary agreement that forbids to conclude deals with foreign governments, but not with private companies abroad, an important change compared to the ethical pact of the company in the first term.
In recent months, the Trump organization has closed deals for hotels and golf resorts in Vietnam, Saudi Aarabia and the United Arab Emirates. Public ethics experts have expressed concern that the personal financial interests of the president in the deals can influence the way he pursues foreign policy.
Price reported from New York.
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