All posts tagged "Ethics"

Critics were stunned Thursday after a Republican lawmaker praised President Donald Trump for his commitment to ethics.

Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC) told Fox News that Trump had made an unprecedented move by following ethical standards, despite mounting reports that the president has collected an estimated $2.2 billion during the first year of his second term in office.

"President Trump has done something no other president in the history of our country said yes to, which is complying [with] the ethics strategy and standard for all elected officials," Scott said. "We've never had a president ever say yes to that issue, that question."...

DJT, Trump Media & Technology Group Corp., stock has reportedly been performing well, but investors may want to exercise caution.

Investors should not count on Trump Media after last week's surge, following President Donald Trump's announcement of a major merger, according to a Barron's report.

"Investors should be wary. No Wall Street analysts cover Trump Media right now," Barron's reported. "A big bet the company has made on Bitcoin already appears to have gone sour, and it reported a net loss of $54.8 million over the third quarter. Shares are still down 53% for the year despite the recent rally. There is also plenty of uncertainty about the future of nuclear fusion. Barron’s argued last week that the most likely outcome is that the stock’s gains fade as timelines for fusion technology get stretched out, costs rise, profits prove elusive, and capital gets harder to raise."...

Reactions started rolling in Tuesday after a Wall Street Journal report revealed that Bill Pulte, the director of President Donald Trump's Federal Housing Finance Agency, was under investigation by ethics watchdogs shortly before the ethics office overseeing the agency was purged.

Pulte oversees the U.S. mortgage market and also runs Fannie Mae and its brother firm Freddie Mac. He has taken over both the company boards and made himself the chairman of both organizations and most recently suggested a 50-year mortgage could make homes more affordable.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency watchdog role was removed earlier this month and the ethics office for Fannie Mae "had received internal complaints alleging senior officials had improperly directed staff to access ... mortgage documents" for officials who have criticized or legally fought Trump, including New York Attorney General Letitia James....

Members of Congress are on a summer stock shopping spree — and still violating a financial disclosure law — amid a reinvigorated movement to ban congressional stock trading.

Three members of the House of Representatives appear to have violated the Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge (STOCK) Act this week by filing required reports late — some as much as two years past a federally mandated deadline.

From Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) to Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), more than a dozen other members of Congress continue trading stocks and securities, even in the immediate two weeks after the Ending Trading and Holdings in Congressional Stocks (ETHICS) Act passed out of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security. ...

The left-leaning watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) sent a blistering letter to House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH) on Thursday, accusing him of abuse of congressional power.

The letter, which also went out to House Oversight Chairman James Comer (R-KY), highlighted what Crew said in a statement constituted "real harm to the American people" being done by political manipulation of oversight authority.

"When oversight is misused for partisan aims, we know that it can chill the exercise of lawful activities in both government and civil society, whether such an effect is intended or accidental," stated the letter, written by CREW director Noah Bookbinder. "Your committee’s oversight activities have done just that and, in the process, have caused real-world harm."...

The woman who was 17 at the time when she allegedly had sexual relations with Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) has been contacted by the House Ethics Committee, according to CNN citing a source.

The GOP-led committee, chaired by Rep. Michael Guest (R-MS), has been investigating Gaetz and recently began conducting interviews of "multiple new witnesses" suggesting it is ramping up its fact-finding efforts.

In recent days, the committee has not only fanned out to question witnesses as part of the Justice Department's sex trafficking crime investigation into the Florida congressman (where last year, no criminal charges were brought), but also to figure out if the Florida pol committed lobbying violations, reports ABC News. ...