Former President Joe Biden’s morality executive order, which contained a pledge for political officials in the federal government, was one of President Donald Trump‘s first official activities. However, he did never retract it as he did during his first word.
In response to that pledge, Biden’s senior tree political appointees were instructed to” undertake to decision-making on the merits and only in the public attention, without regard to personal gain or personal profit.”
Biden’s commitment also included a call for nominees to” commit to do that maintains the liberation of law enforcement and prevents improper meddling with the Department of Justice’s investigative or prosecutorial decisions.”
The commitment read,” I commit to moral choices of post-government jobs that do not cause the impression that I have used my federal service for personal gain, including by using secret data and relationships established for the benefit of coming clients,” the pledge said.
Biden’s commitment, which was enforceable by the attorney general in civil judge with instances, was introduced through an executive order that instantly included lobbying products, revolving-door work, and golden parachutes.
Government accountability and transparency organizations, including the watchdog group Common Cause, have expressed concerns about Trump’s choice to not implement his own executive order, at least so far. In contrast, they praised the ethics pledge he required in his first term. That pledge, for example, included a two-year ban on one-time lobbyists being involved in matters on which he or she lobbied and a five-year ban on ex-appointees lobbying the government.
According to Common Cause senior director of legislative affairs Aaron Scherb ,” It’s extremely frustrating that President Trump would rescind President Biden’s very similar executive branch order after his first term had a fairly strong executive order for executive branch employees.” ” It seems somewhat hypocritical. You know, if he was for this ethics pledges, ethics executive order, the first term, why wouldn’t he be for the second term”?
Still, existing rules impose ethics requirements on officials. Linda Gustitus, a senior adviser to Wayne State University Law School’s Levin Center for , Oversight , and Democracy, told the Washington Examiner there were laws discouraging conflicts of interest, including United States Code Title 18, the government’s primary criminal code, which should be enforced by the Justice Department. The Office of Government Ethics and other regulations require some appointees to make public financial disclosures and sign ethics agreements, according to the Ethics and Government Act, which was passed. An ethics pledge and an ethics agreement differ from one another because they are more general and future-focused, while an agreement is more specific and focuses on the here and now.
” Nobody seems to be paying attention to the fact that there is this Office of Government Ethics, and there are these statutes, and there are these limitations”, Gustitus said. The executive order is “on top of everything else.”
Only 1, 100 of the 27, 000 public financial disclosure form filers, according to a spokeswoman for the Office of Government Ethics, are eligible for” second-level review” and are primarily Cabinet secretaries and department heads.
” There’s a public financial disclosure report”, the spokeswoman said. That is the method we use to identify potential conflicts of interest. For the presidentially appointed Senate-confirmed officials, once the conflicts of interest are detected, then the appropriate resolutions to those potential conflicts ]are identified], and that is what the ethics agreement is. That serves as a reminder of the actions the official will take to resolve any potential conflicts of interest.
For Gustitus, Trump still has a chance to sign a second executive order, but “time is of the essence” “because people are going to be taking jobs where they need to know what their promises are.”
” From what I’ve observed from the appointments and the process, this is all blurred”, she said. ” It’s really incumbent on both Congress and the Office of Government Ethics, and inspectors general, if we have any,” said one inspector.” It’s really incumbent on both Congress and the Office of Government Ethics to step in and report where people have crossed the line or haven’t filed their forms.”
Scherb, of Common Cause, added,” Government executive branch employees work for the American people, and we deserve to know that these federal government employees are working in the public interest, not trying to line their own pockets”.
Trump himself would not be a part of an executive order, with only tradition urging presidents to avoid potential conflicts of interest. Trump’s second son, Eric Trump, for instance, is poised to retain control of the Trump Organization during his father’s second term while the president retains ownership of it. The youner Trump, for his part, has been adamant there will be a “very large wall” between the company and the government, though its , ethics , plan does , not prevent foreign business deals,  , according to the , New York Times.
Concerns about the president’s own conflicts of interest, such as making a meme coin the weekend before his inauguration and this week’s House Republican conference retreat at his resort and golf club near Miami, coincide with Trump’s rescission of Biden’s ethics executive order. Additionally, he owns a majority stake in the publicly traded social media platform Truth Social.
On leaving office, Biden warned of the dangers of a technology oligarchy and technological industrial complex after Tesla and SpaceX CEO and X owner Elon Musk, Meta CEO , Mark Zuckerberg,  , and , Amazon CEO , Jeff Bezos have worked to develop close relationships with Trump, including donating$ 1 million each to the president’s inaugural fund and receiving tickets to his inauguration in the Capitol rotunda.
Trump’s Cabinet additionally includes billionaires, such as Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent,  , commerce secretary , nominee Howard Lutnick,  , education secretary , nominee , Linda McMahon,  , interior secretary , nominee , Doug Burgum,  , NASA administrator , nominee Jared Isaacman, U. S. ambassador to the , United Kingdom , nominee Warren Stephens, and , special envoy to the Middle East Steven Witkoff.
” There certainly wasn’t the’ drain the swamp ‘ theme in the second campaign”, Scherb said.
Trump’s posture toward ethics concerns was previewed last month when transition aides replied to a letter from Sen.  , Elizabeth Warren , (D-MA ) that same day asking for more information about the transition’s plan to avoid , ethical , problems with , Musk. Trump’s transition team published its , ethics , plan in November 2024, but federal laws and regulations do not apply to , Musk as a private citizen and not a government employee, but Warren argued that they should.
” Pocahontas can play political games and send toothless letters, but the Trump-Vance transition will continue to be held to the highest , ethical , and legal standards possible — a standard unfamiliar to a career politician whose societal impact is 1/1024th of Elon , Musk’s”, now-White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told the , Washington Examiner at the time.
WASHINGTON EXAMINER CLICK HERE TO ACCESS MORE INFORMATION
Trump was referred to as the “most transparent and accessible president in American history” by the White House this week, citing his open media approach.
Leavitt told reporters during her first briefing that” there has never been a president who communicates with the American people and the American press corps as openly and authentically as the 45th and now-47th president of the United States.”
