Donald Trump's plan to remove himself from his businesses without divesting ownership doesn't even come close to solving the problem of potential conflicts of interest, the director of the Office of Government Ethics said Wednesday.
"We can't risk creating the perception that government leaders would use their official positions for profit," Walter Shaub said at the Brookings Institute. "That's why I was glad in November when the president-elect tweeted that he wanted to, as he put it, 'in no way have a conflict of interest' with his businesses. Unfortunately, his current plan cannot achieve that goal." The Office of Government Ethics is independent and nonpartisan, and works with executive branch officials to prevent conflicts of interest. Last week, the office sent Democrats in the Senate a letter advising them that they were still waiting for many of Trump's Cabinet nominees to send over their proper ethics packages.
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