The Trump administration can legitimately lay claim to being the most corrupt in US history. I certainly would vote for that distinction! Not because of the amount of money involved, though that is probably far more than has so far been revealed, nor even because of the numerous conflicts of interest the Trump Organization and friends have created. My main reason is the “in-your-face” quality of the corruption–a deliberate, deceitful flaunting of legal and ethical violations of the public trust by this president and most of his family. Trump, Ivanka, Jared et al. challenge members of Congress and others in a position to take action to stop them from openly using their positions to further enrich themselves. Such corruption will be the enduring legacy of Donald J. Trump.
Just two examples recently brought to light for your reading displeasure: (1) Trump’s abortive hotel deal in Azerbaijan with known corrupt politicians in that country who had (or have?) links to Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, dissected in agonizing detail by Adam Davidson at http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/03/13/donald-trumps-worst-deal; and (2) Jared Kushner’s sister (!) trying to sell wealthy Chinese in Beijing on investing a half-million dollars in a Kushner property so that they can secure a US immigrant investor visa (www.washingtonpost.com/world/in-a-beijing-ballroom-kushner-family-flogs-500000-investor-visa-to-wealthy-chinese/2017/05/06/cf711e53-eb49-4f9a-8dea-3cd836fcf287_story.html).
Someone once said that transparency is the vaccine against the disease of corruption. But how is transparency going to help when you have a criminal family that acts as though it is immune?
In the Human Interest - Mel Gurtov 