[ { "start": 0.144, "end": 24.432, "text": " Welcome, everyone, and welcome back if you're rejoining us. I am thrilled to have with us for the second hour of this special program, lawyer and deep thinker, Law Professor Richard Painter. If his name sounds familiar to you, that is because Mr. Painter, Professor Painter, served as the White House" }, { "start": 24.432, "end": 51.216, "text": " Chief White House ethics lawyer in the George W. Bush administration, Professor Painter considers himself, self-describes as an independent, and he is here to talk with me about corruption in government. And I think this is such an important topic in this moment, because again, no matter where you find yourself on the political spectrum, we universally" }, { "start": 51.216, "end": 78.656, "text": " hate the corrupting influence of money in politics. This is a shared value that we have. And so it is with great humility and respect and thanks that I welcome you, Professor Painter, to the Maggie Dawn Show. Thank you for being here with me. Well, thank you for having me on the show, Maggie. How do you define corruption? And why do you think it has been so persistent and so difficult?" }, { "start": 78.656, "end": 101.04, "text": " to eradicate, not just in the United States, but in many, many countries. Well, the different forms of corruption. There's, of course, bribery, where a public official, whether a judge or a legislator or executive, takes money from an interested body in order to take official action and return money." }, { "start": 101.04, "end": 128.928, "text": " There are also financial conflicts of interest where a judge or an elected official has a financial interest in a matter that they are deciding in an official capacity, which is in the federal government, a criminal offense for anyone in the executive branch. Although we have curiously exempted the president, the vice president from that statute, the members of Congress also have exempted themselves from that statutory criminal definition of corruption. And yet," }, { "start": 128.928, "end": 150.224, "text": " It is widely understood that a public official having a financial interest in a matter that they decide on behalf of the government is corrupt, even if it doesn't violate a criminal statute. So there are many different types of corruption. There's also a structure of justice trying to hide evidence of wrongdoing." }, { "start": 150.224, "end": 178.368, "text": " that brought down Richard Nixon and the type of conduct that we've seen repeatedly, particularly in the Trump administration. And so the public recognizes corruption when we see it, just as the Supreme Court said, the famous pornography case, we recognize it when we see it. But the problem is it's not always illegal corruption. And politicians get away with it." }, { "start": 178.368, "end": 206.448, "text": " The campaign finance system is, in many ways, corrupt. We see that billionaires and large corporations can decide who wins an election. And we have George Soros on the left and Elon Musk and the Koch brothers on the right influencing elections. Many, many Americans perceive that as corrupt, and yet the U.S. Supreme Court decided to sit as the United v. Federal Election Commission back in 2009." }, { "start": 206.448, "end": 233.648, "text": " that money, equating money with political speech, that the money has the First Amendment right. And so there, once again, we see a disjuncture between what the law says is illegal and that which the public views as corrupt. So when we look at corruption, when the public knows it, we can see it, we can feel it." }, { "start": 233.648, "end": 257.616, "text": " What are some of the downstream consequences of this very permissive legal structure? And I would I would offer even in those instances where we have criminally defined a type of corruption That frequently prosecutions Can fall apart they're complicated not always but that" }, { "start": 257.616, "end": 279.04, "text": " Again, I don't think the public generally feels like corrupt politicians are ferreted out. What are some of the downstream effects, the way that it might impact you and I and just regular folks in the United States? How does that impact people's day to day lives? Well, it depends on the type of corruption." }, { "start": 279.04, "end": 308.64, "text": " When we see corruption of Congress by the fossil fuel industry, which I testified about in front of the Senate Budget Committee in June of 2023, enormous amount of money coming in from fossil fuel companies to the Congress, both Democrats and Republicans, that has made it very difficult for the United States to formulate an effective policy to address global warming and the climate crisis." }, { "start": 308.64, "end": 332.464, "text": " The consequences there are very, very severe. The worst consequences may, of course, be in the far distant future, or actually not so distant future. But that's just but one example. And the members of Congress do not take it seriously. Senator John Kennedy of Louisiana responded my testimony with personal attacks going after my..." }, { "start": 332.496, "end": 361.376, "text": " subject matter I posted on Twitter about corruption in the Supreme Court, which is another problem we're confronting. And other issues, even citing a Marxist professor who had gotten in a spat with me. Here's John Kennedy, citing whether Marxist or try to attack me. Why? Because I exposed campaign money from fossil fuel industry. Two weeks ago, I testified in front of the Senate Banking Committee about another issue, cryptocurrency." }, { "start": 361.376, "end": 382.592, "text": " enormous amounts of money coming in from the cryptocurrency industry in the Congress to pass legislation that supposedly will regulate cryptocurrency. And there were CEOs of big cryptocurrency companies sitting there with me at the witness table. And I pointed this out. I also pointed out President Trump's financial conflicts of interest there in cryptocurrency." }, { "start": 382.592, "end": 406.544, "text": " his own personal financial interests. And once again, Senator Kennedy got so upset, he ended up concluding his five minutes of testimony by calling me a whack job. It was just two weeks ago. Obviously, the members of Congress, the senators, the members of the House and Senate are very sensitive to anyone exposing" }, { "start": 406.544, "end": 423.536, "text": " their campaign contributions, their financial conflicts of interest, whether it's cryptocurrency or fossil fuel companies, the president's conflicts of interest. They're very sensitive to this, to the point that they're going to make it personal very quickly if you confront them." }, { "start": 424.944, "end": 451.456, "text": " Folks, this is Professor Richard Painter. He is a professor at the University of Minnesota Law School. He is the former chief White House ethics lawyer under the George W. Bush administration and independent, self-described independent and an expert in corruption. What did you make Professor Painter? You brought up climate change and the absolute" }, { "start": 451.456, "end": 478.832, "text": " direct corrupt influence of big oil's money in campaigns. What did you make, sir, of Donald Trump's promise in front of oil company executives? Just give me a huge amount of money, help me win election, and you'll make way more on the end because I'll get rid of regulations. And the announcement from the Trump administration that the EPA is no longer going to be addressing climate change is that" }, { "start": 478.832, "end": 498.384, "text": " corruption out loud in front of us that's it right there is that one of those things that that the public can see touch and feel but the laws don't touch yes it is it is all the money coming into the political campaigns from the fossil fuel industry" }, { "start": 498.384, "end": 522.88, "text": " is exhibited for corruption, and that's been going on for decades. And now we have members of Congress and the president of the United States with a personal financial interest in some of those ventures. Some members of his administration have had a personal financial interest, although they at least need to divest their interest in fossil fuel companies if they're going to get involved with regulation of fossil fuel companies." }, { "start": 522.88, "end": 552.704, "text": " But a lot of people come in and out of the industry. They're revolving door in and out of government. And there is a, it's quite clear that the fossil fuel industry has a lot of power in Washington Day State. And what that's doing is it's slowing down our ability to respond with modern technology to our energy needs and to come up with other ways other than fossil fuels to supply our energy needs." }, { "start": 552.704, "end": 580.112, "text": " And it's really unfortunate because there's not only about climate change, but also economic growth, that we could have a lot more economic growth in this country if we could confront the climate change problem head on with new technology rather than bearing ourselves in the past. But we have a vision of energy policy that's really rooted in the mid 20th century." }, { "start": 580.112, "end": 604.688, "text": " It's the energy equivalent of trying to reopen out the prison because we've seen some good movies about it. Rather than looking forward to what the world could be like. And how we can grow our economy and protect our planet in the 21st century. Books again, this is Professor Richard Painter, former Chief White House Ethics Lawyer, Professor of Law at the University of Wisconsin." }, { "start": 604.752, "end": 631.184, "text": " There's my Wisconsin bias showing at the University of Minnesota Law School. You talked about the fact that the law sometimes doesn't reach corruption. And, sir, I wanted to get your reaction to one of the Supreme Court's rulings from this past term that basically said, grabbing public officials is fine as long as you pay them after the fact, and it's not a clear..." }, { "start": 631.184, "end": 652.928, "text": " quid pro quo. What did you make of that ruling by the Supreme Court? Well, that was a case involving a mayor down in Indiana. It was applying a federal statute. It basically what they're saying is the federal law can be used to prosecute a state or local government official for a gratuity. That's a payment after the fact." }, { "start": 652.928, "end": 672.816, "text": " only the bribery statute. The bribery statute would only apply if there is a understanding of a quid pro quo, official action return for payment before the fact. But the gratuity, the tip after the fact is not prosecuted." }, { "start": 672.816, "end": 701.504, "text": " or under the federal statute for the state and local government employee. Now, there is a federal statute on gratuities for federal employees, so it's still illegal for them. But basically, the Supreme Court said they're going to leave that issue up to the states. I find that case problematic. I think the even worst case, though, was decided well over 10 years ago involving the former governor of Virginia who exchanged cash for official meetings. You pay money." }, { "start": 701.504, "end": 728.64, "text": " you get to meet the governor. And that's what the government proved when they convicted the governor of Virginia under the federal bribery statute. And the Supreme Court came along and said, now paying for access to a public official, that's not bribery. It's only bribery if you are able to get the public official to agree to a particular official action as a quid broke well for a payment, a bribe." }, { "start": 728.64, "end": 758.56, "text": " But payment for access to public official is not a bribe. Well, this is really a quite narrow definition of bribery. Now, it's not surprising the Supreme Court might come down that way because you think about it. We think about all these campaign contributors are getting access all the time to members of Congress and the president of the United States and others by donating extra money to the Republican or the Democratic Senatorial Committee or some other group. You pay money to get access." }, { "start": 758.56, "end": 787.264, "text": " And, of course, the Supreme Court justices themselves have the billionaires who want to take them on their yacht excursions when the term is over. And so, yes, I can see why the court might come down where it does, but the public, I don't think sees it that way. This is bribery, exchanging official meeting for cash. Which a meeting is an official act, as far as I'm concerned. We're going to come right back with Professor Richard Painter. We're going to get into..." }, { "start": 787.264, "end": 812.976, "text": " the potential for cryptocurrency to explode the levels of corruption here in the United States. If you're going to want to stay tuned, my name is Maggie Dawn. You are listening to the Civic Media Radio Network. This is our cryptocurrency special. Don't go anywhere. I'm Maggie Dawn. You're listening to the Civic Media Radio Network, our special guest for the entire hour on this, our cryptocurrency episode is Professor" }, { "start": 812.976, "end": 842.512, "text": " Richard Painter. He is a law professor and expert in corruption at the University of Minnesota. He is the former chief White House ethics lawyer in the George W. Bush administration. He is a self-described independent. And he also has served as the vice chair of the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, also known as CREW. We're going to talk about one of the lawsuits that CREW brought during the first Trump administration." }, { "start": 842.512, "end": 871.344, "text": " But I wanted to finish our discussion about paying for access And it's one of those things that I think it's so prevalent these days Or the idea that huge campaign donors will of course get get get the meeting right they their phone calls will get answered I think the idea that rich people can pay for access large businesses can pay for access is one of the things that has led" }, { "start": 871.344, "end": 893.728, "text": " regular folks to feel so disengaged, disenchanted and angry about elected officials writ large. Tell me more about your thinking about the problem with paying for access. Well, it's been long understood that paying money to get access to public official is corrupt." }, { "start": 893.728, "end": 921.472, "text": " And I think it quite clearly meets the definition of bribery, common law as the term was understood at the time of the founding of our country. And the Constitution does specifically mention bribery as an impeachable offense for a president, a vice president, a cabinet member, a judge or justice. We should keep in mind that the founders were very, very angry at attempts to extract cash." }, { "start": 921.472, "end": 947.04, "text": " in return for official meetings. There was a big diplomatic fuss scandal with France in the 1790s. The United States sent diplomats over to France to meet with the government to try to avoid war with France and avoid getting entangled in the war between France and Great Britain, yet another war between France and Great Britain." }, { "start": 947.04, "end": 974.064, "text": " And Taliran, the foreign minister of the French government, the directory at the time, this was after the king had been off the throne in the French Revolution. And the Taliran said, it made it very clear that nobody can meet with him unless he paid off his agents, his bag men, diplomatic officials, French diplomatic officials who are simply labeled with the letters X, Y, and Z. It was known as the XYZ affair." }, { "start": 974.064, "end": 1003.008, "text": " Thomas Jefferson was absolutely furious because he was not president yet. This was during the Adams administration, but he was behind efforts to try to reach out to France to avoid the United States getting entangled in that war. We send the diplomats all the way over and they're being told you can't see the foreign minister unless you pay them off, personally pay them off. The American diplomats came home and the Adams administration ended up in what we call the quasi war with France." }, { "start": 1003.008, "end": 1030.08, "text": " So this was corruption of the worst sort had serious consequences for the relationship between the United States government and France This corruption was on the French side But it shows how the founders were absolutely disgusted with his idea of paying money to get access to public official Now how in the world would they have tolerated this from the governor of Virginia? And so well the governor of Virginia could do that which they thought was corrupt" }, { "start": 1030.08, "end": 1057.872, "text": " uh for tally around the french prime foreign minister i i don't think so and i think that they would have said that a governor virginia who asked for cash in return for meetings with the governor was corrupt and should be thrown out of office and yet the u.s supreme court in interpreting the criminal statute uh we should keep in mind it is a criminal statute defining bribery said the governor of virginia could not be criminally charged for bribery for demanding payment" }, { "start": 1057.872, "end": 1080.416, "text": " in return for official meetings. Once again, this leads up in the question of whether impeachment proceedings are appropriate. Obviously in a state, you would impeach the governor under state law, but in the federal government, if people are paying cash for access to a public official, does that justify impeachment?" }, { "start": 1080.416, "end": 1106.896, "text": " What if the president of the United States issues a meme coin and then has a dinner for people invest the most amount of money in his meme coin? In fact, putting money in his pocket, which is what President Trump did just a month or so ago. This is very, very troubling. There's payment of access, payment of cash, for access to a public official, whether it's campaign contributions, buying a meme coin or anything else." }, { "start": 1107.568, "end": 1132.272, "text": " books that's Professor Richard Painter of the University of Minnesota Law School. I have so many questions that are popping into my head, sir. When we look back at Trump 1.0, the problems are still legion, but they seem almost trite in comparison to what we are seeing now." }, { "start": 1132.272, "end": 1161.232, "text": " I want to get into this a bit with you, including what I'm going to call out loud extortion of law firms and universities. But you, as one of the key leaders of crew, again, that is citizens for responsibility and ethics in Washington, you sued President Donald Trump during his first administration in 2017 for violations of the emoluments clause." }, { "start": 1161.232, "end": 1185.68, "text": " This seems to be such a, like of course that was a violation. I want to ask you, what came of that lawsuit? We're going to start at the end of that story and then work our way backwards. Did Donald Trump, and we only have about a minute left, did Donald Trump end up having to divest himself of additional assets or do anything differently because of the lawsuit?" }, { "start": 1185.68, "end": 1207.392, "text": " No, he dragged it out through the courts, as the courts are, get about standing. They found the crew did not have standing, neither did Democrats in Congress. Businesses that competed with Donald Trump apparently did have standing, but it took three years to sort that all out. And he dragged it out another year, and then the Supreme Court of the United States dismissed the lawsuit when he left office in 2021." }, { "start": 1207.392, "end": 1235.248, "text": " The lawsuits have not been refiled. They could be, but once again, we'd have to find a plaintiff who had standing to sue. And the courts are very strict about who gets to sue and who doesn't. We'll be right back. You're not going to want to go anywhere. We're getting into the meat points. Donald Trump's stable coin. What does all of this mean to regular people, you and your family here in Wisconsin? Stay tuned. I'm Maggie Don. This is our cryptocurrency special here on the Civic Media Radio Network." }, { "start": 1235.824, "end": 1261.184, "text": " Welcome back, everybody. I'm Maggie Dawn. You're listening to the Maggie Dawn Show here on the Civic Media Radio Network. We have an expert in corruption with us this afternoon. His name is Richard Painter. He's a professor of law at the University of Minnesota. He is the former chief White House ethics lawyer under the George W. Bush administration. He is a self-described political independent." }, { "start": 1261.184, "end": 1288.464, "text": " And I'm going to call you just a straight talker, sir, because you call them like you see them. And I think we need to return to a bit of that. You, as one of the leaders of the citizens for responsibility and ethics in Washington back in May, excuse me, January of 2017, when Donald Trump first took office, you sued Mr. Trump for violating the emoluments clause. What is the emoluments clause and why is it important?" }, { "start": 1288.464, "end": 1315.936, "text": " Well, the founders were well aware of the risk that United States government officials be corrupted by other nations through various payments, profits and benefits. That's when a monument is a profit or advantage when you look up the word a monument, Dr. Samuel Johnson, 1755 dictionary, the English language. And the framers were very aware of this problem because the Europeans were doing it all the time." }, { "start": 1315.936, "end": 1342.48, "text": " The French king was always trying to bribe various officials in the English government, improbably vice versa. Whenever there was an election for a new king, Poland, they elected the kings of Poland at various times. The Russians and others would get involved and pan people off. And so this was very common where the public officials in one European country would be on the payroll of another one." }, { "start": 1342.48, "end": 1360.48, "text": " And so the founder said, oh, you're not doing that over here. If you're going to be a United States government official, this doesn't just apply to the president, but anyone holding an office of trust with the United States government, you are not going to take any gifts, any titles, or any emolument that is a profit or benefit from a foreign government." }, { "start": 1360.48, "end": 1382.96, "text": " And that would include profits and benefits from companies controlled by foreign governments or sovereign wealth funds. So for example, if you're president of the United States, you shouldn't be able to set up a cryptocurrency firm and have a sovereign wealth fund then invest in your cryptocurrency firm. That would be in a monument. We had this problem in the first Trump administration, mostly with respect to hotels." }, { "start": 1382.96, "end": 1405.184, "text": " In golf courses and various real estate deals or deals where they put the Donald Trump's name on a building somewhere in the world and then he Miraculously get paid for that But now he's into cryptocurrency and so we may have a lot more in monuments going on And also by the way, I'd say a free airplane from Qatar there that's 747" }, { "start": 1405.184, "end": 1430.176, "text": " Yeah, that that's for use of the airplane there That would be a monument a gift from foreign government all that covered by their monuments close prohibited without the consent of Congress That's what the founder said you go to Congress you get consent So Donald Trump wants all these of monuments from foreign governments and gifts and the airplane and the rest of it You can go to Republican control Congress and ask for a resolution approving" }, { "start": 1430.176, "end": 1454.752, "text": " his receipt of the gifts in a monument. It's like Benjamin Franklin did during the Articles of Confederation, which had a similar provision. He got a snuff box with a bunch of diamonds on it from the king of France when he was ambassador of France. And he went to the Congress and he said, hey, could I have permission to keep the snuff box? And Congress gave him permission. They said, it's okay. You keep Louis VI's snuff box there." }, { "start": 1454.752, "end": 1483.264, "text": " Uh, but that was important. I mean, Louis the 16th was a bit controversial. He ended up getting his head chopped up in the next revolution. Uh, you know, we can't have diplomats taking money from, uh, foreign leaders or gifts or snuff boxes or a 747 without the consent of Congress. So that's what Donald Trump bought it. But I don't think Speaker Johnson is really enthusiastic about a resolution in front of Congress to, uh, give Donald Trump, uh," }, { "start": 1483.264, "end": 1507.6, "text": " permission to accept the 747 Cotter with same country that has funded Hamas to tune of a couple billion dollars. This is a Congress that doesn't even want to confront the situation with F. Steve Piles. So what does Donald Trump do? He just wants to go ahead and take the plan anyway. And the various other amendments. Why? Because there's no way to enforce the amendments clause if he can't get someone in court withstanding to a suit." }, { "start": 1507.6, "end": 1537.136, "text": " And they would not let Cruz, that isn't responsible in ethics in Washington, have standing. They would not let the Democrats in the House and Senate have standing. They just missed that lawsuit down in District of Columbia. I guess the business that competes with Donald Trump, they have standing according to the courts. Well, I don't know what we're going to do, because who's going to be competing with his 747 from Qatar? I don't think that was the purpose of the Miami's clause. The purpose of the Miami's clause was to protect our government from under influence, from foreign governments." }, { "start": 1537.136, "end": 1565.856, "text": " Giving gifts and profits and benefits to United States government officials including our president And it's not being complied with that's a serious problem Yeah, it's a conveniently narrow definition of who would be able to sue under the emoluments clause that has effectively rendered it annulity To disastrous effect somewhat argue and this professor painter. This isn't something that is specific" }, { "start": 1565.856, "end": 1594.656, "text": " to a Republican president if these things that are framers thought to include like the emoluments clause cannot be enforced the next time again I I I always want to try to take this out of the partisan context this isn't good for democracy small d no matter what party you may or a listener may find themselves affiliated with at any point in time and" }, { "start": 1594.656, "end": 1617.84, "text": " I would offer I think on the international stage when you look at foreign policy it is credibility reducing the United States as honest broker that you know what do we stand for when we tell the truth we stand up for the little guy we do hard things these some mythologies about being an American well" }, { "start": 1618.064, "end": 1647.744, "text": " We start losing credibility when our president starts taking gifts from foreign leaders or accepting hacking influence to you know impact an election from Russia These things to me Are are deeply important in this moment, but they are deeply important always and Americans of good faith should be able to demand better of our elected officials" }, { "start": 1647.744, "end": 1676.592, "text": " Sir, what do you make of Donald Trump's stance and the use of executive orders targeting law firms and universities? Well, let's start with the law firms, because what he's clearly doing with the law firms is retaliating against law firms for representing clients. And some of those clients were his political opponents. In other cases, retaliating against law firms because partners of those firms have left the firm to go and work on federal investigations of Donald Trump." }, { "start": 1676.592, "end": 1704.464, "text": " And so he's retaliating against their law firm. And in a democracy, it's absolutely critical that people have the right to counsel, not just Republicans, but also Democrats and independents, such as myself, have the right to counsel. And there are going to be contested elections, such as Bush versus Gore. But both Bush and Gore were entitled to counsel. And we can't have a situation where the winner" }, { "start": 1704.464, "end": 1731.376, "text": " can come in and then retaliate against the lawyers who represented the loser. And if Donald Trump beat Hillary Clinton in 2016 because he won the electoral college, he didn't win the popular vote, he then goes after Hillary Clinton as the lawyers. He goes after lawyers who represented the other side in his failed effort to contest the 2020 election, which he clearly lost to Joe Biden." }, { "start": 1731.376, "end": 1760.976, "text": " And this is an infringement on the right to counsel, which is a fundamental infringement on First Amendment right to petition the government for redress of grievances. If I can't hire a lawyer to go on a court and argue my case, because my lawyer is afraid of retaliation against themselves and their law firm by the president of the United States, for practical purposes, lost the right to counsel. Now, I think the courts are realizing this and are issuing quite a few orders against President Trump." }, { "start": 1760.976, "end": 1786.192, "text": " on his retaliation against Perkins Cooley coming in burling and some of these other law firms. I think he's going to lose those cases, but it's done a lot of damage in the meantime, his attacks on the lawyers and the right to counsel. The university is somewhat different situation because there there's an enormous amount of federal funding. I mean, law firms not getting any money from the federal government." }, { "start": 1786.192, "end": 1811.792, "text": " But we've had a lot of federal funding, mostly for scientific research in our major universities. But it's quite clear that President Trump is saying, look, I'm going to cut off that federal funding unless you cut a deal that makes me look good, that accomplishes some of my political objectives. So he's using scientific research funding, which we would think whether we should support, whether we're Democrats or Republicans." }, { "start": 1811.792, "end": 1840.4, "text": " It's good to fund scientific research. We can debate about where that research should be spent and how, what type of universities. I'd like to see more money going into the big public universities. I've worked in public education for 30 years, rather than the big IVs, but you know, we put all that aside. Bottom line is, should that be a political weapon in order to get a university to give in to Donald Trump on completely unrelated matters? And that's what he's doing there." }, { "start": 1840.4, "end": 1868.288, "text": " What Harvard University has done is taken the court, because his demands are really quite excessive with respect to Harvard, with respect to the federal funds. And we're going to see where that goes. I think they're likely to succeed in the long run. But he's doing quite a bit of damage, of course, to Harvard. And there are other universities that are not as wealthy. They're going to be in a position where they need to cave in and give Donald Trump what he wants." }, { "start": 1868.288, "end": 1898.256, "text": " In the middle of all this, he's using the controversies over anti-Semitism to score political points. I sometimes wonder how much the administration really cares about the problem of anti-Semitism itself or whether it's really just being used as a political weapon. So we'll see what some of those cases above the universities go. With Columbia University agreeing to effectively pay $200 million," }, { "start": 1898.256, "end": 1919.44, "text": " just breathtaking I think the chilling effects of all of these actions are really striking at some of our most closely held values right that that we want to fund science we believe in the right to counsel and the right to free speech and yet that those are the values" }, { "start": 1919.44, "end": 1948.448, "text": " that are actually being attacked. And we have to, I think, get to a point where we can set aside the politics, small p, and the personalities to see how our values are either being upheld or eroded under this particular president. Our guest this hour is Professor Richard Painter. He is the former White House chief ethics lawyer under George W. Bush. He is a political independent, and he is our special guest." }, { "start": 1948.448, "end": 1965.632, "text": " here on the Maggie Dawn show for this hour. Professor Painter, is the Trump administration the most corrupt administration in modern American history? Well, they're certainly, they're trying to get that prize there. I mean, Richard Nixon was, was a pretty bad situation." }, { "start": 1965.632, "end": 1993.904, "text": " With what happened with Watergate and the cover up and he'd fire people who politically, you know, disagree with him or whatever And so Richard Nixon pushed the limits of the law as well But he didn't have the personal financial conflicts of interest to the extent that Donald Trump did And also you had both a Supreme Court and Congress that old me is willing to stand up to him The Supreme Court of the United States said Nixon had to turn over those White House tapes to the special prosecutor" }, { "start": 1993.904, "end": 2014.576, "text": " When Nixon fired the special prosecutor, Archie Cox, Congress said, hey, you're going to have to put another one in there. We're going to impeach it. And then finally, Senator Goldwater and some other Republicans went over to the White House and said, it's not a resign, Mr. President, because the votes were there in the Senate to convict him if he was impeached. So they stood up to him. I'm not so sure we'd get that today." }, { "start": 2014.736, "end": 2043.072, "text": " Folks, again, that is Professor Richard Painter of the University of Minnesota Law School, former Chief White House Ethics Lawyer in the George W. Bush administration. When we come back, I want us to think about what do we do about this? What should regular people be asking their elected officials to do to rein in corruption at every level, whether Democrat or Republican?" }, { "start": 2043.072, "end": 2072.24, "text": " Don't go anywhere, folks. I'm Maggie Dawn. This is the Pacific Media Radio Network. Welcome back, everybody, and welcome if you're just joining us. This special episode of the Maggie Dawn Show today talking about cryptocurrencies. In this last hour, we have been talking with University of Minnesota law professor Richard Painter, who's the former chief White House ethics lawyer under the George W. Bush administration. He is a political independent and he has worked as one of the leaders of citizens" }, { "start": 2072.24, "end": 2101.92, "text": " for responsibility and ethics in Washington, also known as crew. And just a few weeks ago, he was testifying before Congress was considering regulating cryptocurrencies. Sir, in my mind, Donald Trump's issuance and his wife's issuance of meme coins, which basically opens him to all sorts of influence peddling. You can basically write a check to Donald Trump by buying his meme coin and his new creation of" }, { "start": 2101.92, "end": 2126.352, "text": " a stable coin, the technicalities of which we talked with our guest last hour about, but the stable coin is being used in multi-billion dollar deals by a sovereign, a foreign sovereign wealth fund. Again, this seems to me to be out loud and proud corruption." }, { "start": 2126.352, "end": 2154.96, "text": " the buying of influence. Certainly a president using the office of the president to enrich himself and his family. What should people be asking their elected officials to do about corruption writ large, but specifically the, I think, fairly significant threat that cryptocurrencies pose because they are very" }, { "start": 2154.96, "end": 2181.872, "text": " non-transparent. What should we be asking our elected officials to do about this? Well, the cryptocurrency presents multiple problems. First is, yes, it is not transparent and payments from foreign governments, foreign sovereign wealth funds can be made to American politicians, including the president of the United States without anybody knowing about it. It's going to be very, very difficult to monitor what's going on." }, { "start": 2181.872, "end": 2206.8, "text": " with these cryptocurrency payments and investments. Only if there's a federal criminal investigation can those payments be tracked down, maybe by federal prosecutors. And that's not sufficient. So that's problem number one. The second problem is that cryptocurrency is not well regulated. They're looking at bills now to regulate cryptocurrency, to say they're regulating cryptocurrency. Those bills are drafted by the industry." }, { "start": 2206.832, "end": 2235.392, "text": " And that's why we have the Senate Banking Committee here in two weeks ago when I went and testified with CEOs of cryptocurrency companies sitting right next to me at the witness table. Those companies have plowed enormous amounts of money into campaign contributions to Congress. That's why Senator John Kennedy, Louisiana was very sensitive about that because the campaign contributions are all sensitive. And cryptocurrency is not well-regulated." }, { "start": 2235.392, "end": 2257.6, "text": " And will we have cryptocurrency become another unregulated financial instrument that causes an economic crisis? We're not there yet. We don't have the magnitude of the trading volume of cryptocurrency that we did in securities based swap agreements and mortgage backed securities before the 2008 financial crisis, but we could get there and right now we've got the federal government." }, { "start": 2257.6, "end": 2284.592, "text": " at the pass of the president of the united states urging banks to invest more in crypto uh fanny may and freddy max said you can use crypto to prove as part of your assets to get a home mortgage uh we may even have a federal government crypto reserve uh with the federal government is buying crypto obviously all this pressure on the buy side is going to push prices up president trump owns crypto so of course he's going to benefit when prices go up" }, { "start": 2284.592, "end": 2311.776, "text": " but they could this by a government sponsored pump and dump scheme where that which goes up eventually comes down and we've seen this so many times in our economy with unregulated financial interests we start with the stock market the 1920s before the crash in 1939 they said they regulated the banks in the 1927 McFadden Act and as I told Congress Senate just two weeks ago" }, { "start": 2311.776, "end": 2337.616, "text": " Of course, that didn't work. Just three years later, the whole banking system collapsed. They allowed the banks to write the regulations. We allowed the securities industry to write the rules on securities-based swap agreements and mortgage-backed securities during deregulation in the Clinton years. A lot of this was the fault of the Clinton administration. And then the Bush years, they didn't re-regulate any of it. And of course, we got the 2008 collapse. Do we really want to do all that again?" }, { "start": 2337.616, "end": 2366.896, "text": " I don't think so. And the crypto industry's been trying to buy access to both political parties. Just think Sam Bankman Freed. All that money raised by Bankman Freed, his mother, Barbara Freed, had a huge pack, giving enormous amounts of money to the Democrats called Mind the Gap pack. She was pressuring him to put more FTX money into that. He was testifying in front of Congress, telling them how to regulate the crypto industry months before he was arrested. And then he goes off to the slammer." }, { "start": 2366.896, "end": 2393.248, "text": " And a lot of them now are sort of putting on the red hat, swapping the blue hat for the red hat that Donald Trump's in. Even Bankman Freed is giving jailhouse interviews to Tucker Carlson and talking about how great Trump is. And his father, Joe Bankman, wrote an op-ed in the Washington Post saying that Trump's solving wealth fund was a brilliant idea and we ought to substitute it for the corporate aid cup tax. I mean, these are people who are flaming liberals just two or three years ago, but they've all gone maga." }, { "start": 2393.248, "end": 2418.0, "text": " So you could clearly see an industry, both the people in prison and the people who may be honest, but who don't understand the need for sound regulation, trying to buy access to the United States government. And I am very worried about how this is going to end up for our financial system. We don't figure out how to regulate crypto. Professor, we have just about a minute left." }, { "start": 2418.0, "end": 2439.808, "text": " Thank you for sharing your expertise. My final question, based on your last statement, are we careening towards an economic and broader crisis in this country if folks don't stand up and vote their values and demand more of our elected officials? We could have an economic crisis if we don't focus on the regulation of crypto." }, { "start": 2439.808, "end": 2465.952, "text": " a currency and not let people like Sam Bankman freed, advised Congress on how to have to draft the regulations. We're certainly going to have a climate crisis if we don't address the influence of the fossil fuel industry and try to move toward cleaner sources of energy. We haven't talked about war and the influence of the military industrial complex, which President Eisenhower pointed out in 1961. We now have one trillion dollar defense budget." }, { "start": 2465.952, "end": 2490.322, "text": " And we're getting into all sorts of wars. Apparently, the president will go to war whenever he feels like it, although that's not what the Constitution says. So, yes, we've got a number of crises we're going to confront if we don't rein in abuses of presidential power and corruption in all three branches of our government. Thank you, Professor Richard Painter. I'm Maggie Dawn. You've been listening to the Civic Media Radio Network." } ]