Donald Trump’s transition team has failed to sign important government ethics agreements, leading to his nominees being “blocked” from the agencies they will soon be controlling, according to a report.
Trump hasn’t been sworn into office yet but, as one U.S. senator recently said, he’s already delaying his legal responsibilities when it comes to signing an ethics agreement that has to be on file before a presidential transition takes place.
The Trump transition’s “unprecedented delay” is causing an issue with access to government records and even cybersecurity assistance, according to Politico.
For example, according to Politico, Trump’s pick to head the Department of Health and Human Services has been “rebuffed” in efforts to communicate with outgoing government officials.
“Advisers to Robert F. Kennedy Jr. reached out to the Health and Human Services Department multiple times after Donald Trump tapped him to lead the massive agency, hoping to jumpstart coordination before his takeover in late January. They were rebuffed,” according to the report. “Kennedy’s inability to communicate with the agency he may soon manage, confirmed by an administration official with knowledge of the episodes granted anonymity to describe internal deliberations, is just one consequence of the president-elect’s continued foot-dragging on signing the standard trio of ethics and transparency agreements with the federal government — something his team pledged to do shortly after the election.”
That’s not the only thing that’s being held up by the “standoff,” the report states.
“It also means they can’t access cybersecurity support or secure email servers for transition-related work, or request FBI background checks for their nominees,” it says. “Amid an uptick in hacking this year — including breaches of Trump’s own team as recently as August — experts are alarmed that the transition is eschewing federal cybersecurity support, particularly as they begin to receive intelligence briefings.”
The report further states that, “until the standoff is resolved, Trump’s Cabinet nominees will gain no more insight than the general public into the workings of the departments they’re supposed to run.”
“And the public remains in the dark about potential ethical and financial entanglements of the transition staffers helping Trump select the bevy of Cabinet nominees he has announced in recent days,” it says.
