Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-MD) wrote to the White House’s top lawyer Thursday, demanding to know why, in the White House’s words, “many regulations promulgated by the Office of Government Ethics do not apply” to executive branch employees.
At issue was the White House’s response to Kellyanne Conway, counselor to the President, plugging Ivanka Trump’s clothing line during an appearance on “Fox and Friends” on Feb. 9.
Despite the Office of Government Ethics’ recommendation that the White House consider disciplinary action against Conway, no such action was taken. After reviewing the incident, Deputy White House Counsel Stefan Passantino wrote to OGE Director Walter M. Shaub, Jr.: “[W]e concluded that Ms. Conway acted inadvertently and is highly unlikely to do so again.”
“I remain concerned about Ms. Conway’s misuse of position,” Cummings wrote to the White House on Thursday. “Your letter concedes that [Conway’s] televised statements from the White House press briefing room implicated the prohibition on using one’s official position to endorse any product or service. When an employee’s conduct violates 5 C.F.R. § 2635.702, disciplinary action serves to deter future misconduct. Not taking disciplinary action against a senior official under such circumstances risks undermining the ethics program.”
Cummings also mentioned a letter from the Koch brother-funded group Cause of Action, which wrote to the Office of Government Ethics, after it recommended an investigation of Conway to the White House, that the office “may be confused about the coverage of the OGE regulations concerning product endorsements.”
“Strangely, Mr. Passantino then seemed to adopt the argument put forth by the Cause of Action Institute a week earlier and debunked by Director Shaub,” Cummings wrote. “Mr. Passantino asserted in his letter to Director Shaub that ‘many regulations promulgated by the Office of Government Ethics (OGE) do not apply to the employees of the Executive Office of the President.’ He did not provide any further explanation or support for his claim. This perplexing argument is particularly concerning because the President’s transition team cancelled a contract that would have provided ethics compliance training for White House staff and political appointees.”
“The President’s staff need to follow ethics rules—not flout them,” Cummings concluded, before asking the White House to clarify its positions on a series of ethics issues.
Shaub, too, responded to the White House on Thursday, and communicated the White House’s actions to Cummings and Chaffetz.
“Of greater concern” than the lack of disciplinary action for Conway, he wrote, was the White House’s assertions “challenging the applicability of ethics rules and OGE’s authority to oversee the ethics program for the entire executive branch. OGE disagrees with these assertions.”
