美国国家公共电台 NPR Ethics Watchdog Has Big Impact On Federal Workers, But Not On Trump

LOURDES GARCIA-NAVARRO, HOST:

Members of Congress will be returning to Washington tomorrow. And the Senate is scheduled to vote on Wilbur Ross's nomination 1 as secretary of commerce. He's another billionaire. He promises to let go of most of his holdings after an agreement with the Office of Government Ethics 2 to prevent conflicts of interest. As NPR's Peter Overby tells us, the OGE is a tiny agency that faces huge challenges in the new administration.

PETER OVERBY, BYLINE 3: First things first - the Office of Government Ethics does not enforce federal ethics laws. Instead, it helps government officials comply with them. It guides them in filling out forms and avoiding conflicts of interest, as it did with Commerce nominee 4 Ross. Back in November, OGE's director, Walter Shaub, used President Trump 5's favorite social media to tweet some advice, coaxing 6 Trump to divest 7 his business empire. OGE didn't win that one. But as government-reform advocate Meredith McGehee said...

MEREDITH MCGEHEE: I would describe it at this point as the mouse that roared.

OVERBY: And roaring its loudest, in fact, since 1978, when it was created to help keep Washington calm. Congress didn't want another national trauma 8 like the Watergate scandal that brought down President Richard Nixon.

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RICHARD NIXON: People have got to know whether or not their president's a crook 9. Well, I'm not a crook.

OVERBY: Nixon made that declaration in 1973. He was gone the next year. And by the early 1980s, the Office of Government Ethics was a big deal.

JAN BARAN: Government officials didn't disclose their personal financial holdings and wealth until the ethics laws were created.

OVERBY: Washington ethics lawyer Jan Baran.

BARAN: These forms were being filled out and submitted and made public for the first time.

OVERBY: The disclosure requirement led to OGE's biggest controversy 10 up until now. In the mid-'80s, President Ronald Reagan's attorney general, Ed Meese, failed to disclose a financial relationship with lawyers for a Pentagon contractor 11. It was a complicated story. But, ultimately, Meese resigned. For the most part, OGE has worked quietly. It's had a big impact on the federal bureaucracy. It creates things like this training video.

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UNIDENTIFIED MAN: Today we're going to be talking about roles for supervisors 12 in the confidential 13 financial disclosure program.

OVERBY: This is a program that collects annual financial disclosures from 370,000 federal employees, mid-level workers who do contracting, award grants and oversee 14 federal spending - anyone who touches money. OGE's goal is to ensure that federal workers don't have financial interests that could come before the public interest. And that's the rub with President Trump.

While he has stepped back from management of his business empire, he continues to profit from it. Trump notes that the conflict-of-interest law doesn't actually apply to the Oval Office occupant. That's true. But previous presidents complied voluntarily. Walter Shaub, the OGE director, in a rare speech last month suggested that Trump is upsetting a delicate balance.

WALTER SHAUB: Should a president hold himself to a lower standard than his own appointees?

OVERBY: Appointees such as Wilbur Ross, a billionaire like Trump. But to serve his country as commerce secretary, Ross agreed with OGE that he'll resign his positions with 37 companies and sell off his holdings in 80 companies. Peter Overby, NPR News, Washington.