Trump's Unprecedented Conflicts of Interest Provide Grounds for Impeachment

By Robert Reich, Robert Reich's Facebook Page

03 May 17

f Trump isn't impeached for treasonous collusion with Russia to influence the outcome of the 2016 election, he could be impeached for violating Article I Section 9 of the Constitution, called the "emoluments" clause.

Here's an update on his Article I Section 9 violations:

1. Trump has visited a Trump-owned property on 31 of his first 100 days in office ? and on some days he’s visited more than one. The press reports on each visit, essentially advertising the property to the public as the federal government pays money directly to the property to rent space, rooms and even golf carts.

2. The State Department and at least three U.S. embassies even advertised one of his properties online in April when a blog post about Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort was shared on government websites and on their social media accounts.

Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort doubled its initial membership fees from $100,000 to $200,000 days after Trump assumed the presidency.

3. Trump’s International Hotel in Washington, D.C., has been pitching foreign governments to stay there. Less than 10 days after Trump won the election, the hotel hosted a gathering for about 100 foreign diplomats to urge them to book rooms there when they stayed in Washington.

4. Since then, the governments of Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait have booked rooms or hosted events at Trump’s hotel. A business group affiliated with the government of Turkey will host both Turkish and American government officials at its annual conference at the Trump hotel in May.

5. China has approved Trump's copyright application for the Trump brand in China -- a deal worth hundreds of millions of dollars, and done when Trump assured China he wouldn't depart from America's "one China" policy.

6. Both daughter Ivanka Trump and son-in-law Jared Kushner, now Trump’s White House advisers, maintain connections to their own corporate enterprises. The day Ivanka Trump sat next to China’s Xi and his wife at a Mar-a-Lago dinner, the Chinese government approved five new trademarks for her company. Her company continues to apply for trademark protection around the world as sales of her brand soar thanks to her increased publicity.

“No one has ever tried to pull off what President Trump is attempting here, which is to turn the way in which our democracy functions into the way corrupt countries function to enrich their leaders,” says Fred Wertheimer, one of America’s most respected experts on government ethics. “It’s just never been done, and the scale here is enormous.”

And we're only 101 days in.

Remember: Article I, Section 9.

What do you think?