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Donald Trump will keep denying the election results for as long as he thinks there's money to be made off the suckers who believe him.

—  Walter Shaub@waltshaub, former Director of @OfficeGovEthics

This will end. Trump’s stunning corruption will be laid bare.

The scale of his criminality will be exposed, ensnaring his children. They will not be protected by presidential power.

Their name will be an insult, their memory a blight. They will live out their days in shame.

— Steven Beschloss @StevenBeschloss

Trump Still Owes El Paso $569,204 For Campaign Rally, City Says

Local politicians have asked Trump to reconsider returning to the city in the wake of one of the latest mass shootings.

www.huffingtonpost.com

Before President Donald Trump returns to El Paso, Texas, he may want to pay the city the more than half a million dollars he still owes it.

The Trump campaign owes El Paso $569,204 from a rally he held in the city back in February, with the majority owed to the city’s police and fire departments, according to a copy of the bill obtained by the Texas Tribune.

The city sent the Trump campaign a letter back in May asking that he pay his outstanding debt to six departments. It reportedly went ignored.

The Trump campaign did not respond to requests for comment from the Texas Tribune or HuffPost.

Acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker was involved in a company that scammed veterans out of their life savings-but the Senate didn't get a chance to question him about it. Which is why we argued in a court filing today that his appointment was illegal.

— Citizens for Ethics  @CREWcrew - Nov. 26, 2018

• Chuck Grassley, Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan, care to comment or investigate?
• Any difference between World Patent Marketing and Trump University?
• Did Whitaker pay tribute to Trump?
• After Democrats are sworn in January, Whitaker is job #1

Donald Trump’s new acting attorney general, Matthew Whitaker, was involved in a company that scammed US military veterans out of their life savings, according to court filings and interviews.

Whitaker, a former US attorney in Iowa, was paid to work as an advisory board member for World Patent Marketing (WPM), a Florida-based company accused by the US government of tricking aspiring inventors out of millions of dollars. Earlier this year, it was ordered to pay authorities $26m.

Several veterans, two of them with disabilities, said they lost tens of thousands of dollars in the WPM scam, having been enticed into paying for patenting and licensing services by the impressive credentials of Whitaker and his fellow advisers.

Another WPM client, Ryan Masti, who served in the navy and suffers from dyslexia and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), said a WPM representative boasted of the company’s connections to Whitaker and Mast in a promotional telephone call that persuaded him to hand over money.

Masti told the court he lost more than $75,000 after paying WPM to register, develop and promote his idea for “Socially Accepted”, a social network aimed at people with disabilities. He said that in return he received only a press release, a logo and a shoddy website template.

“I spent the money on a dream to help people. And I lost everything.”

Donald Trump visited the golf course for the 159th time as President

Donald Trump visited the golf course for the 159th time as President at Trump National Golf Club near Washington, DC to play golf

thegolfnewsnet.com

• That money could have been used to pay down the debt. #NationalDebt
• Cut Trump’s golf vacations instead of cutting program funding

Trump is spending Sunday at his D.C. area golf club after the confirmation vote for Supreme Court justice nominee Brett Kavanaugh. 

The White House doesn't typically acknowledge Trump was even playing golf. That is commonplace policy, particularly when Trump isn't playing with celebrities or pro golfers or doesn't have something to flaunt. Typically, the White House press pool indicates when Trump arrives at his golf clubs, then they are held in a holding location until Trump is done and moves to his next location.

Opinion | We knew Trump was incredibly corrupt. Turns out he may also be an epic tax cheat.

Blockbuster revelations charge hundreds of millions of dollars in tax evasion.

www.washingtonpost.com

They demonstrate that not only has Trump been lying for years about the enormous amount of money he was given by his father, but also Fred Trump, Donald Trump and Donald’s siblings were engaged in what amounted to a years-long conspiracy to commit tax fraud:

“He and his siblings set up a sham corporation to disguise millions of dollars in gifts from their parents, records and interviews show. Records indicate that Mr. Trump helped his father take improper tax deductions worth millions more. He also helped formulate a strategy to undervalue his parents’ real estate holdings by hundreds of millions of dollars on tax returns, sharply reducing the tax bill when those properties were transferred to him and his siblings.“

• He ran scams like Trump University to con struggling people out of their money.
• He lent his name to pyramid schemes.
• He bankrupted casinos and still somehow made millions while others were left holding the bag.
• He refused to pay vendors.
• He exploited foreign workers.
• He used illegal labor.
• He discriminated against African American renters.
• He violated Federal Trade Commission rules on stock purchases.
• He did business with the mob and with Eastern European kleptocrats. His properties became the go-to vehicle for Russian oligarchs and mobsters to launder their money. 

Unethical behavior has consequences: Ben Carson’s self-dealing undermines HUD’s ability to serve families that rely on its programs.

— Citizens for Ethics @CREWcrew -  Aug. 3, 2018

Carson allowed his son, Ben Carson Jr., and daughter-in-law to help organize and invite prospective business partners to a HUD listening tour in Baltimore, despite warnings from HUD lawyers that doing so risked violating ethics rules. HUD’s Office of Inspector General (OIG) initiated an investigation into the matter in February.

Last year, Carson also broke federal law by approving a $31,000 expenditure of taxpayer funds on furniture for his office dining room. Then, HUD management demoted one of the staffers who raised concerns about the exorbitant spending. Her retaliation claims are also being investigated.

Then there is the curious case of Alfonso Costa, Jr., the son of Carson’s “best friend,” former business partner and campaign donor. Last summer, Costa finished his second year at Harvard Law School.

Carson hired Costa into a full-time “special assistant” position at a salary of $44,941, despite knowing that Costa would return to school three months later. 

Secretary Carson can ill-afford to hire unqualified cronies. The latest semi-annual report by HUD’s Acting Inspector General found that five audits or evaluations issued during Carson’s tenure lack timely management decisions.

read the article for the specifics

The court has ruled that the Emoluments Clauses of the Constitution can be enforced in court. The lawsuit against President Trump is moving forward.

Citizens for Ethics‏ @CREWcrew -  July 26, 2018

Americans need to know that their president is acting in their interest and not in the interest of his private businesses. President Trump has refused again and again to separate himself from his business empire to avoid pervasive conflicts of interest and constitutional violations. A court has now decided that the Emoluments Clauses, put in place by the framers of the Constitution to protect against corruption, are broad and can be enforced in court. We look forward to working with Maryland and the District of Columbia to prove their case and stop these insidious violations.

You are paying for the Trump brothers to travel the world on Trump Organization business

Their secret service details are racking up hundreds of thousands of dollars in travel costs.

www.motherjones.com

The trips documented by CREW, spanning only the early months of the Trump presidency, are just a snapshot of the travel undertaken by Trump’s sons.

The eye-popping expenses are contained in documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act by watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. Extensive details of the Dubai trip’s itinerary—including arrangements for a seaplane to take the brothers and their protective entourage to private islands in the Maldives—are included in the records, which were released by CREW on Wednesday.

Taxpayers don’t pay for the Trumps to travel, but they do foot the bill for their protective details. These trips often include stays in high-priced, luxury hotels, such as the One&Only Royal Mirage in Dubai, where the Trump brothers jetted in February 2017 to meet with Hussain Sajwani, their business partner in a Dubai golf resort.

• January 2017:  a trip to Uruguay by Eric Trump, which cost taxpayers at least $97,000. 
• January 2017: the Secret Service spent roughly $30,000 to accompany Eric Trump to the Dominican Republic, where he met with his father’s former business partners
• February 2017: taxpayers shelled out more than $50,000 for a visit the brothers made to Vancouver, Canada for the opening of a new Trump hotel there. More than half of those charges were paid to the Trump hotel
• June 2017: trip to Europe, apparently planned on the spur-of-the-moment, by Tiffany Trump (estimated Secret Service cost: $22,000)

10 headlines that will make you wonder how Scott Pruitt still has a job

When I asked The Point's own Brenna Williams to gather up the most recent headlines surrounding EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt, I knew that a) there would be a lot and b) most of those would be negative. But what she turned up surprised even me.

www.cnn.com|Analysis by Chris Cillizza, CNN Editor-at-large

Here are the major headlines about Pruitt from just the past month:

1. Emails: Pruitt used EPA aide to inquire about Chick-fil-A business opportunity
2. Pruitt aide inquired about used Trump hotel mattress for him
3. New York Times highlights Pruitt's cozy relationship with a coal baron
4. EPA paid $1,560 for 12 fountain pens, emails show
5. EPA emails could contradict Pruitt testimony on apartment hunt
6. EPA spent nearly $3.5M on Pruitt security
7. Pruitt contradicts ex-EPA security chief email over use of sirens in non-emergencies
8. Pruitt asked for 24/7 security immediately, contradicting previous claims
9. Pruitt dinner included Vatican figure accused of sexual abuse
10. Memo says Pruitt flew first class to avoid 'lashing out from passengers'