U.S. official who confronted Trump on
ethics resigning for new job
Send a link to a friend
[July 07, 2017]
By Julia Harte
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The head of the U.S.
Office of Government Ethics, who clashed with President Donald Trump and
his administration, said on Thursday he would resign before his
five-year term ends in January to take a new job.
In a letter to Trump dated on Thursday and posted on his Twitter
account, Walter Shaub said he would step down from the ethics watchdog
effective July 19 and praised his staff for their commitment to laws and
ethical principles over private interests.
Shaub has sounded many alarms over the Trump administration's business
entanglements. He urged Trump to divest from his business empire rather
than turn management of it over to his sons, and chastised the White
House for not disciplining presidential advisor Kellyanne Conway after
she endorsed a fashion line sold by Ivanka Trump, the president's
daughter.
Shaub said in an interview with the Washington Post published Thursday
that he was not pressured to leave, but felt that he could not achieve
more in the ethics office under the Trump administration.
Democratic lawmakers lauded Shaub's service. Chuck Schumer, the top
Senate Democrat, said he looked forward to examining Republican Trump's
nominee to replace Shaub. Schumer said he hoped the successor would
prevent lobbyists and private interests from "rigging the system against
working families under the cover of darkness."
Elijah Cummings, the top Democrat on the House Oversight and Government
Reform Committee, urged the Republican chairman of the committee to
invite Shaub to testify to the panel about necessary ethical reforms.
[to top of second column] |
Undated handout photo of Walter Shaub. REUTERS/U.S. Office of
Government Ethics/Handout
Some Republican lawmakers, such as Cummings's former Republican
counterpart, Jason Chaffetz, had little praise for Shaub during his
tenure. Chaffetz rebuked Shaub in a January letter for making public
statements about Trump's finances.
Shaub will next head the Ethics Practice at the Campaign Legal
Center, a Washington-based nonpartisan group dedicated to democratic
reform, said Larry Noble, the group's general counsel.
Noble said that the Center learned of Shaub's interest in leaving
his government job in the last two weeks and seized the chance to
hire him.
Shaub's work at the Campaign Legal Center will involve examining
deficiencies in existing ethics laws and developing ways to
strengthen them, both at the Office of Government Ethics and in the
realm of congressional ethics, Noble said.
(Reporting by Julia Harte and Susan Heavey; Editing by Grant McCool)
[© 2017 Thomson Reuters. All rights
reserved.]
Copyright 2017 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
|