Trump’s Watered-Down Ethics Rules Let a Lobbyist Help Run an Agency He Lobbied
President Trump’s executive order on ethics also cites a section of the law that doesn’t exist.
Geoff Burr spent much of the last decade as the chief lobbyist for a powerful construction industry trade group. Burr sought to influence a host of regulations of the Department of Labor, opposing wage standards for federal construction contracts and working against an effort to limit workers’ exposure to dangerous silica dust.
In the Obama administration, someone like Burr would have been barred by ethics rules from taking a job at an agency that he had lobbied.
In the Trump administration, Burr now has a top job at the Labor Department.
Burr is the first publicly known example of a former lobbyist who was able to take a job in the government as a result of President Donald Trump’s watering down of ethics rules in place during the Obama administration.
As a candidate, Trump regularly railed against lobbyists and led crowds in chants of “Drain the swamp!” But as president, Trump last month signed an executive order that weakened significant aspects of the Obama ethics policy, including scrapping a ban on lobbyists joining agencies they had recently lobbied.
Ethics experts say Burr’s hiring is a troubling example of how the new administration has greased the revolving door.
“A lobbyist like Burr may de-register on Monday and enter the Trump Administration on Tuesday,” said Craig Holman of the watchdog group Public Citizen. “The very same agency Burr has been lobbying as a hired gun is now Burr’s to help run. This is a grave problem for the public because the agency may well represent the special interest rather than the public interest.”