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citizens for responsibility and ethics in washington
Democrats, Legal Groups Urge Supreme Court to Block Trump Ballroom Without Congressional OK
"The Constitution's system of checks and balances ensures that no individual or branch of government holds absolute power," said one legal expert. "The president is ignoring this design."
Aug 18, 2026
Just days after President Donald Trump's administration asked the right-wing US Supreme Court to allow construction of a new White House ballroom to continue while a legal challenge plays out, federal lawmakers and advocacy groups on Tuesday urged the justices to block any more work on the project absent congressional approval.
"The Constitution's system of checks and balances ensures that no individual or branch of government holds absolute power," said Trevor Potter, president of the nonpartisan Campaign Legal Center, which filed an amicus brief with Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW).
"The president is ignoring this design by unilaterally demolishing the East Wing of the White House and trying to construct a massive ballroom with private funds, raising the risk of corruption that constitutional checks are supposed to prevent," he continued.
Potter stressed that "Congress, not the president, is empowered to raise and spend taxpayer dollars—and it has not authorized the ballroom. The administration's reliance on private donor funding for the ballroom project violates a core principle of separation of powers embedded in our Constitution."
CREW president Donald Sherman highlighted that "President Trump has spent his second term creating pay-to-play opportunities for corporations to curry favor and advance his personal priorities, without regard for the Constitution or the American people's best interests."
Trump kicked off his second term with an inauguration dubbed "a coronation of our country’s descent into oligarchy" because of the billionaires who got prime seating at the event. Since then, according to recent disclosures, he's pocketed at least $2.2 billion, over half of it from his family’s crypto scheming.
Amid alarm over Trump's enrichment of himself and his allies—and his plummeting approval rating—Sherman said that "the Supreme Court should deny the request for a stay and ensure that this administration isn't allowed to run roughshod over the separation of powers and dodge congressional approval for spending taxpayer dollars."
Sherman and Potter's groups were far from alone in filing a brief with that demand; dozens of Democrats who serve as ranking members of various committees across both chambers of Congress as well as the minority leader, whip, and caucus chair in the House of Representatives submitted a similar filing to the nation's top court.
The Democrats "understand that the Constitution empowers Congress—not the President—to control federal property, including
determining whether (and how) parts of the White House should be demolished or constructed," their lawyers wrote, noting that they previously sent a brief to US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, which earlier this month upheld a district judge's ruling that halted most construction.
The filing argues that the injunction should remain in place, and "the construction the president seeks should not proceed until Congress authorizes that construction and appropriates the funds for it," an event that is unlikely during this session, even with the GOP's narrow control of both chambers.
Welcoming the lawmakers' brief, Jon Golinger, democracy advocate at the watchdog group Public Citizen, asked, "If President Trump is so proud of his Golden Ballroom, why is he so afraid to ask Congress to approve it?"
"A key reason the Constitution requires Congress to authorize the White House ballroom project is to ensure transparency and oversight of the '$335 million of an expected $400 million' that the White House says it's raised from donors, including corporations who have been awarded billions in government contracts and anonymous donors with secret agendas," Golinger said.
"We agree that by law Congress needs to authorize it and urge the court to reject the White House's desperate 'Hail Mary' pass," he added. "The Supreme Court is expected to decide by this Friday whether to intervene in the ballroom case or to allow the Court of Appeals injunction to take effect, which would block further ballroom construction unless and until Congress authorizes it."
The National Trust for Historic Preservation, which is behind the legal challenge to the project, also sent its arguments against Trump's ballroom on Tuesday. The group's president and CEO, Brent Leggs, noted that "last week, the administration made two audacious claims in asking the US Supreme Court to greenlight continued aboveground construction of the White House ballroom."
"First, that no court in the land has the authority to stop them," he explained. "And second, that because they are using the same indestructible concrete used in nuclear power plants, it would be impossible to remove the ballroom even if ordered to do so. They are working around the clock in an attempt to outrace judicial review."
Leggs said that in its filing, his group "reiterated that the administration has no unilateral legal authority—constitutional, statutory, or otherwise—to build a ballroom on the site of the now-demolished East Wing, unless and until Congress expressly approves. Each court that has reviewed this case has agreed with the National Trust. We hope the Supreme Court will uphold the rule of law by stopping this illegal project."
"Our position was supported by several amicus briefs, including one from the Society for the Rule of Law and former Republican White House lawyers," he added. "These briefs highlight the point the National Trust has made for months: The executive branch lacks unilateral authority to destroy or transform the White House, and cannot use national security as a justification for ignoring the Constitution."
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Lawsuit Filed Against 'Blatantly Corrupt' Trump Scheme to Charge for Early Access to Market-Moving Social Posts
"Nothing could be more antithetical to the free, independent press than the president charging for early access to his public announcements."
Aug 12, 2026
A lawsuit filed on Wednesday is challenging the legality of Truth API, a recently unveiled initiative to allow Wall Street firms to pay up to $100,000 per month in exchange for early access to potentially market-moving social media posts from President Donald Trump.
The complaint, filed by the Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF) and The Intercept, alleges Truth API violates the US Constitution's First Amendment by granting insiders special access to the president's announcements.
The scheme also violates the Constitution's Fifth Amendment by "charging unreasonable sums that cannot be justified to offset the cost" of receiving the benefit of information from the president, the complaint states.
The lawsuit describes Truth API as "profoundly corrupt," given that "the president stands to gain financially by giving 'market-moving' government information to those who are willing and able to pay his personal company."
In establishing the plaintiffs' standing, the complaint argues that The Intercept is being put at a competitive disadvantage by the scheme, given that the news outlet is "both unable and unwilling to subscribe" to it, even though it risks "losing out on timely news to competing organizations."
Ben Muessig, editor-in-chief of The Intercept, accused the president of "trying to enrich himself by privatizing government information that he has no right to sell," while vowing that "we won't let that stand."
David Bralow, chief legal officer for The Intercept, said that "nothing could be more antithetical to the free, independent press than the president charging for early access to his public announcements," emphasizing that "public information belongs to the public."
Seth Stern, chief of advocacy at FPF, said Truth API "is so blatantly corrupt and unconstitutional that it would have been hard to even fathom just a few years ago."
"Trump’s crooked scheme is particularly outrageous," Stern added, "because, as documented by our Trump Anti-Press Social Media Tracker, he frequently uses his Truth Social account to berate journalists and even to announce his plans to sue them and criminally investigate them. Then, he makes them wait in line behind paying customers to find out about it unless they’re willing to subsidize the platform he uses to attack them."
The Intercept and the FPF are being represented in the case by attorneys from Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), the Yale Law School Media Freedom and Information Access Clinic, the Public Integrity Project, and Altshuler Berzon LLP.
Nikhel Sus, chief counsel at CREW, said his organization was "proud to represent our clients in their effort to end this corrupt and unconstitutional scheme" because "all Americans are entitled to timely access to their president’s public statements, not just those willing to pay the president’s company $100,000 a month."
Truth API has also drawn the attention of Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), ranking member of the US House Judiciary Committee, who announced a probe into the initiative last month, describing it as an "insider-information scheme" that "will enable Wall Street to profit from the president’s frequent market-moving posts on major businesses."
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DHS Chief Threatens 'Prison Time' for State Election Officials Who Don't Comply With Trump Schemes
"They are losing, and they know it. Election officials will not be intimidated," said Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer.
Jul 17, 2026
US Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin on Friday threatened state election officials with prison time if they do not comply with the Trump administration's "mandatory" changes to how they run their elections.
During a press conference, Mullin said that the Trump administration was making so-called "security enhancements" to US elections "mandatory," adding that any uncooperative states will be penalized.
"If these states want a grant and they want to be reimbursed to run federal elections, they're going to have to implement security issues," Mullin said. "We're saying that your [voting] machines have to be secured and that your voter registration list needs to be scrubbed."
Later in the press conference, Mullin elaborated further on penalties states could face if they didn't "scrub" their voter rolls to the administration's specifications.
"The states that choose... not to participate in securing the elections, we will make sure we make those states a priority to look into who voted in their states, and hold then the election officials accountable," he said. "If the election officials, once we gave them the information they need to secure their elections, and they chose not to, then those individuals can also be held accountable."
Mullin added that this accountability can come "by fines, by penalties, and even, depending on how far it goes, prison time."
Mullin says that election officials in states that don’t cooperate with the Trump administration may face jail time pic.twitter.com/FvIaKmTEdc
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) July 17, 2026
Article 1, Section 4 of the United States Constitution explicitly gives states the power to run their own elections, while granting the US Congress the authority to implement federal regulations if needed.
The executive branch of the federal government is given no role in the administration and regulation of elections.
Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom reacted to Mullin's threats of jail time for election officials with defiance.
"California has free, fair, and secure elections and we will fight for them," Newsom wrote in a social media post. "Try us."
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) similarly vowed to fight the administration's efforts to meddle in the elections.
"They are losing, and they know it," Schumer wrote. "Election officials will not be intimidated. Senate Democrats will make sure resources are in place to fight back against any illegal activity by the Trump administration."
Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-Ga.) warned that Mullin's Friday statements appear to be an escalation in the administration's tactics.
"First, they sent the FBI to seize ballots in Georgia," he wrote. "Then, they tried to get data on election workers in Fulton County. Now, they’re threatening to imprison election officials. This is escalating quickly. Every single American should be alarmed."
Government watchdog Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington also indicated it would file legal challenges to the administration's efforts to take over the elections process.
"The Constitution gives states, not the federal government, the power to administer elections," the group wrote. "That's for a good reason, but the Trump admin keeps trying and failing to grab power anyway. We're fighting back in court."
Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, senior fellow at the American Immigration Council, expressed skepticism that the Trump White House's election meddling would be successful.
The Department of Homeland Security "has literally zero power to do this," Reichlin-Melnick wrote. "The Trump admin has lost every single lawsuit on their efforts to get state voter data or change voter requirements. The power to administer elections is given to the states."
Historian Patrick Wyman similarly predicted the administration's efforts would end in failure.
"They’re going to threaten this stuff, they’ll ham-fistedly screw up the implementation, commit seven atrocities, and still lose every election that matters in November," Wyman wrote. "We’re now nearing the 'fuck you, do it, see what happens' stage of this confrontation."
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'This Is Corruption': Trump Bought Stock in Taser Maker Just Before ICE Contract Notice
"There's a reason why Trump fired the ethics watchdog who oversaw corruption and conflicts of interest in the executive branch," said one critic.
Jun 29, 2026
US President Donald Trump bought up to $5 million worth of stock in the corporation that makes Taser electroshock guns, police body cameras, and policing software two weeks before his administration announced the solicitation of a $220 million contract apparently tailored to the company's product and services, CNBC revealed Monday.
CNBC's Luke Falcon reported that Trump disclosed the purchase of between $1-5 million in Axon Enterprise stock on February 10. Two weeks later, US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) announced it was seeking a five-year, $220 million deal for 17,800 conductive energy weapons, unlimited cartridges, and support services.
Axon Enterprise stock skyrocketed over 22% immediately following ICE's announcement, although they're down more than 25% this year.
According to Falcon:
If finalized, the purchase would more than quadruple ICE’s current Taser arsenal, replacing about 4,300 devices in the field, according to the February notice.
The notice refers to an upgrade to the “T10,” Axon’s “Taser 10" model, to replace ICE’s older “X26P/X2 Tasers,” which are also Axon-made. It also specifies features associated with Taser 10, including a 45-foot range and 10 individually targeted probes—all specifications and capabilities that procurement experts say effectively foreclose other bidders.
"The concern is that [Trump] bought into a company whose business could grow if his own administration expands immigration enforcement," Jordan Libowitz, vice president for communications at the liberal-leaning watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, told CNBC.
Deborah Fleischaker—a former acting ICE chief of staff during the Biden administration who is now a senior immigration policy adviser at the Latino advocacy group UnidosUS—told Falcon that the timing of Trump's purchase "raises red flags."
“It is not smart to buy stock in a company that was impacted by the decisions you would be making at the agency,” she said. “I would have stayed far, far away from actual impropriety, or the appearance of impropriety.”
The ICE contract notice came as the agency and other Department of Homeland Security divisions were set to reap tens of billions of dollars in new funding thanks to Republicans' so-called One Big Beautiful Bill Act.
White House spokesperson Anna Kelly insisted that "there are no conflicts of interest" and that Trump's investments are managed by independent third parties.
"But the sequence raises a public integrity question: A president with a newly disclosed financial interest in a law enforcement technology company led an administration expanding immigration enforcement when one of its agencies sought a major purchase of products closely associated with that company," The Intellectualist contended on Monday.
Campaign for New York Health executive director Melanie D'Arrigo said on social media Monday: "Trump bought up to $5 million in stock of a company seeking an ICE contract that specifies products unique to that company. This is corruption. There's a reason why Trump fired the ethics watchdog who oversaw corruption and conflicts of interest in the executive branch."
Democrats on the House Oversight Committee and several watchdog groups have published running lists of dozens of instances of alleged and proven conflicts of interest and other corruption that have enriched Trump and his family by billions of dollars during his second term in office alone.
On Sunday, The New York Times reported that Trump and US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick reached a billion-dollar agreement with Kazakhstan to develop of one of the world's largest untapped deposits of tungsten, a key metal used to make missile warheads, fighter jets, computer chips, and other products.
According to the Times, within weeks of the deal taking shape, investors associated with Dominari Securities—a firm partly owned by Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump, the president's sons—acquired a 20% stake in an entity connected to the Kazakhstan tungsten project. Lutnick's sons also reportedly raised capital for one of the project's investors, a role for which they stand to make millions of dollars.
"The corruption is breathtaking," former US Labor Secretary Robert Reich said Monday on social media in response to the Times report.
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'Fuck This Coin': Trump Crypto Gala Admission Price Plummets as Meme Coin Value Down Over 90%
The president and his family made billions off Trump meme coins while investors got fleeced.
Apr 24, 2026
The price to attend Saturday's second "VIP reception" for investors in President Donald Trump's meme coin has plunged nearly as much as the cryptocurrency itself, leaving investors bamboozled and bankrupt.
Meme coins are highly volatile cryptocurrencies inspired by internet memes, jokes, or cultural trends. While many thousands of meme coins are introduced daily, the overwhelming majority of them fail after a short period as influencer-driven hype and investor "FOMO"—fear of missing out—subside.
The president's $TRUMP meme coin debuted just before his January 2025 return to the White House. Its price soared by more than 50% after its website announced last April that the coin’s top 220 investors would be invited to a private gala dinner with the president. The watchdog Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) revealed that invitees included dozens of investors in crypto assets named after white supremacist and outright Nazi themes.
However, even then, $TRUMP was already down significantly from its high of over $75 just after its launch. On Friday, it was trading at less than $3, and the top-tier entry price to Saturday's gala at the president's Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida is indicative of that precipitous plunge.
Tomorrow, President Trump will host an event for 297 $TRUMP memecoin holders at Mar-a-Lago. It’s the second time in less than a year that the president has offered special access to people who can afford to buy enough of his memecoin—and it’s somehow even worse than the first.🧵
— CREW (@citizensforethics.org) April 24, 2026 at 7:36 AM
According to the Financial Times, the 29 premier access attendees of Saturday's event held a median investment of $539,000. That's nearly 84% less than the $3.28 million median investment they had prior to last year's gala. Furthermore, the newspaper reported that many premier access winners have apparently liquidated their $TRUMP holdings since securing their VIP spots.
“Nobody likes it,” Morten Christensen, a crypto investor who went to last year's gala and plans on attending the Mar-a-Lago dinner, told Politico Thursday. “People are losing on the coin, and they are vocal. They are the people on Twitter like, ‘Fuck this coin’ or, ‘It’s a scam.’ And they’re right, basically.”
That's not stopping the gala organizers from touting what they're calling “THE MOST EXCLUSIVE CRYPTO & BUSINESS CONFERENCE IN THE WORLD!”
As Politico reported Thursday:
It is open to the top 297 $TRUMP investors, who will get the chance to hear from an eclectic lineup of speakers that includes several crypto executives, boxing legend Mike Tyson, motivational coach Tony Robbins, and Trump, who will speak during the event’s luncheon, according to promotional materials. He is expected to be in Washington later in the day for the White House Correspondents’ Dinner.
While $TRUMP investors may be losing big, Trump and his family have made billions of dollars in crypto profits, while the Trump family and the coin's creators raked in $320 million in trading fees, even as the coin's value tanked.
A small group of elite investors has likewise been spared severe losses, including insiders who bought up $MELANIA, First Lady Melania Trump's meme coin, prior to its launch, a practice known as "sniping" that netted them around $100 million, according to the Financial Times.
$MELANIA launched on the eve of Trump's second inauguration and soared to an all-time high of $13.73 on Inauguration Day. It's now trading at $0.12, a 99% dive. Investors subsequently sued $MELANIA's creators, alleging that it's part of a fraudulent "pump-and-dump" scheme in which they manipulated the launch of $MELANIA and other coins in order to enrich themselves while later investors got wiped out.
That's not the only lawsuit targeting the president's family over alleged crypto fraud. Billionaire investor Justin Sun is suing World Liberty Financial, a cryptocurrency firm co-founded by Trump and his sons, accusing the company of illegally blocking Sun from selling up to $1 billion worth of digital tokens. Sun said last year that he's the world's largest single holder of the president's meme coin.
Last year, US Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), and Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), as well as Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), launched investigations into $TRUMP events.
“He’s normalized his corruption,” Blumenthal said of Trump during a Thursday interview, adding that the Mar-a-Lago gala is “simply another way to generate more money for himself, profiting directly from his office."
Trump—who once said he's "not a fan" of cryptocurrencies, "whose value is highly volatile and based on thin air"—has pushed crypto since returning to office, most notably in a January 2025 executive order calling for the establishment of a working group on digital assets to explore the possibility of creating a “national digit asset stockpile," a top crypto industry wish list item.
“It is literally cashing in on the presidency—creating a financial instrument so people can transfer money to the president’s family in connection with his office,” Campaign Legal Center executive director Adav Noti said last year.
Experts have warned prospective investors about the dangers associated with $TRUMP.
“Two exclusive promotional events offering access to the president created temporary price increases but did not reverse the long-term downward trend,” Marquette University finance professor emeritus David Krause wrote last month.
“With approximately 80% of the token supply controlled by Trump-affiliated entities and over $324 million in trading fees accruing to insiders, the token raises significant questions about the alignment of promotional activities with retail investor protection,” Krause added. “As political meme coins continue to emerge, the $TRUMP token may serve as a cautionary case for the risks of speculative assets tied to political figures.”
Looking forward to Saturday's Mar-a-Lago gathering—which Trump may not even attend, according to small print on the event's website—CREW said Wednesday that "like the first event, Trump will almost certainly host holders of alt-right and racist coins, foreign attendees—including those with potential ties to foreign governments—and people seeking favors."
"This weekend will provide a prime example of the level of corruption and profiteering that no other president would have even dreamt of engaging in, but Trump is comfortable doing so openly," the group added.
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‘Ruthlessly Corrupt’: Democrats Take Aim at Trump's ‘Plunder’ of US Taxpayers in New Bill
Sen. Elizabeth Warren said the bill would stop Trump from "trying to snatch up billions of taxpayer dollars to line his own pockets and settle personal scores."
Apr 15, 2026
Four Democratic lawmakers on Wednesday unveiled legislation aimed at ending what they described as President Donald Trump's "plunder" of US taxpayers.
The Ban Presidential Plunder of Taxpayer Funds Act—cosponsored by Sens. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Reps. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) and Dave Min (D-Calif.)—was crafted in response to Trump's effort to get the federal Internal Revenue Service to hand him a $10 billion settlement for the 2020 leak of his tax records and his demand that the US Department of Justice (DOJ) pay him $230 million over its past criminal investigations of him.
Among other things, the bill would bar both the president and the vice president, as well as their immediate family members, from collecting settlement payments from the federal government while in office.
The proposed legislation would also prohibit both the president and the vice president from filing administrative claims for damages while in office, and would only allow presidents and vice presidents to "collect compensatory damages awarded by a federal court if the court appoints an independent counsel to represent the agency and makes all proceedings public."
The bill allows former presidents and vice presidents to collect damages from the federal government, but only if the agency being sued "appoints career expert staff to lead the agency’s review or adjudication of any administrative claim brought by the former president/VP, and no official appointed by any president/VP is involved in handling the claim."
Additionally, any settlement made to a former president or vice president must be made public within seven days.
Warren said that the legislation was necessary to stop Trump from "trying to snatch up billions of taxpayer dollars to line his own pockets and settle personal scores."
Raskin accused Trump of exploiting the power of his office to "loot billions of dollars from American taxpayers," an operation that he described as the "ongoing scandal of this ruthlessly corrupt administration."
"The ‘Ban Presidential Plunder of Taxpayer Funds Act’ will prevent the president from pursuing the emerging MAGA grift of suing the government as a ‘plaintiff’ on bogus grounds," Raskin added, "and then settling the suit as ‘defendant’ for big bucks, a collusive settlement scam they recently executed with the disgraced former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn, who waltzed off with more than a million dollars for a bogus claim already dismissed by a federal court."
Flynn settled with the DOJ last month in a case in which he accused the government of "improperly and politically" targeting him, after he was charged with making false statements to the FBI in 2017.
The Democrats' bill has earned the endorsements of government watchdogs Democracy Defenders Action, Common Cause, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), and the Project on Government Oversight (POGO).
Debra Perlin, vice president of policy at CREW, praised the bill for establishing "common sense guardrails to protect against corrupt payouts to the president and the vice president during their terms in office and after they depart."
"Since returning to office, Donald Trump keeps finding troubling new ways to enrich himself at the taxpayers' expense," Perlin noted. "The president’s lawsuit against the IRS for $10 billion is emblematic of a pattern of self-dealing and corruption that appears pervasive in his administration."
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Dems Introduce Bill to 'Stop Apparent Bribery Involving Trump Ballroom Donations'
"Billionaire companies are bankrolling Trump’s ballroom and it stinks of bribery," said Sen. Elizabeth Warren.
Nov 18, 2025
Amid concerns over President Donald Trump's White House ballroom, a pair of Democratic US lawmakers on Tuesday introduced legislation "to root out apparent bribery and corruption" involving the $300 million project.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Calif.) introduced the Stop Ballroom Bribery Act, described by Warren's office as "the first piece of legislation addressing the ballroom that would impose donation restrictions."
“Billionaires and giant corporations with business in front of this administration are lining up to dump millions into Trump’s new ballroom—and Trump is showing them where to sign on the dotted line," Warren said in a statement. "Americans shouldn’t have to wonder whether President Trump is building a ballroom to facilitate a pay-to-play scheme for political favors. My new bill will put an end to what looks like bribery in plain sight."
Billionaire companies are bankrolling Trump’s ballroom and it stinks of bribery.That’s why @robertgarcia.house.gov and I introduced a bill to crack down on this potential corruption.
[image or embed]
— Elizabeth Warren (@warren.senate.gov) November 18, 2025 at 11:16 AM
Garcia said: "Donald Trump is raising hundreds of millions of dollars to build himself a White House ballroom at a time when millions of American families can barely make ends meet. It's outrageous that the White House won’t reveal who’s bankrolling Trump’s pet project, and that the people’s house could be funded by shady figures, corrupt money, and bad actors."
"This bill will ban contributions from anyone with a conflict of interest, prevent bribery, and ensure we can hold any administration accountable for blatant corruption," he added.
Noting that many of the "wealthy individuals, corporations, and organizations" funding the ballroom "need something from the Trump administration," Warren's office flagged "serious concerns of quid-pro-quo arrangements and possible bribery."
"Ethics experts have argued that the apparent pay-to-play relationship between Trump and business leaders oversteps the norms of presidential behavior and could erode Americans’ trust in government," the senator's office added.
As Warren's office noted:
Key ballroom donors currently have business interests in front of the Trump administration. For example, Google, which recently donated $22 million to settle President Trump’s censorship lawsuit against YouTube, will benefit if Trump’s [Department of Justice] decides not to appeal a recent judicial ruling in a relevant antitrust case. Meanwhile, Union Pacific Railroad is seeking federal approval of a lucrative merger and Palantir is working to get more federal contracts.
The White House has refused to be fully transparent, publishing only a noncomprehensive donor list missing multiple key donors and offering donors anonymity. Donations for projects like the ballroom are often channeled through the National Park Service and philanthropic partners; nonprofits with formal ties to property used by the president and [Vice President JD Vance] raise unique conflict-of-interest risks when fundraising from individuals and corporations with interests in front of the federal government.
The Stop Ballroom Bribery Act would:
- Impose pre-donation restrictions, including banning contributions from entities and individuals that present a conflict of interest, make it clear that donations cannot be conditioned on receipt of benefits from the federal government, require congressional approval for foreign donations, and proscribe the president and other senior officials and their families from taking donations;
- Impose post-donation restrictions, including banning the display of donors’ names and logos, enact a two-year cooling-off period before a donor to a covered project can lobby the federal government, and prohibit conversion of leftover donated funds to anyone’s personal use or to benefit the president and other senior officials and their families;
- Require transparency, including the disclosure of any meetings with senior federal officials or their relatives within a year of the donation, and mandate National Park Service publication of all donations to covered projects and ban anonymous donations; and
- Enable enforcement, judicial review, and the pursuit of civil and criminal penalties for violators.
"President Trump's decision to unilaterally destroy the East Wing of the White House to build a ballroom financed by wealthy individuals and corporations not only ignores our country's laws but raises serious ethical concerns—namely, whether individuals and corporations funded this project in the hopes of buying access and influence," said Debra Perlin, vice president for policy at Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), which supports the legislation.
Virginia Canter, chief counsel and director for ethics and anticorruption at Democracy Defenders Action—another backer of the bill—said that "over the past year, President Trump has raised millions of dollars for vanity projects at the White House—like paving over the Rose Garden and demolishing the beloved East Wing."
"These funds have come from private donors without meaningful transparency or accountability,” Canter added. “The highest office in the land should never be for sale, nor should it ever appear to be."
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'Pay for Access': Critics Level Corruption Charges at Trump Over White House Ballroom Dinner
Trump's "betrayal of Americans is brazen" said a DNC spokesperson.
Oct 16, 2025
President Donald Trump on Wednesday evening held an event at the White House to thank some of America's richest corporations for financing his planned $250 million ballroom—an event that garnered the latest accusations of corruption against a president who has also raked in billions of dollars in profits in the cryptocurrency market since he took office.
As reported by The Washington Post, Trump "treated donors from Silicon Valley, Wall Street and the defense sector to a candlelit dinner in the East Room on Wednesday as a thank-you, praising them for quickly heeding his call for support and noting some offered as much as $25 million."
Trump also told the guests in attendance that they would likely be inviting to the ballroom's grand opening.
According to a report from The Wall Street Journal, several of the most powerful corporations in the US sent representatives to attend the dinner, including Apple, Lockheed Martin, Microsoft, Meta, Google, Amazon, and Palantir. Others expected to attend were Stephen Schwarzman, founder of investment firm Blackstone, as well as prominent cryptocurrency investors Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss.
The White House dinner drew immediate criticism from the Democratic National Committee (DNC), which labeled it a "cash-for-access" event that took place as Americans across the country are struggling to afford basic necessities such as groceries and healthcare, and as the Republican Party has refused to negotiate with Democrats on extending healthcare subsidies in exchange for ending the government shutdown.
"This administration’s slogan should be ‘Let them eat cake,'" said Rosemary Boeglin, communications director for the DNC. "Trump is busy wining and dining with his rich friends and wealthy donors while failing to make a deal to end the government shutdown. Instead of trading cash for access, Trump and his Republican loyalists in Congress should be getting back to work to reopen the government and avoid a healthcare crisis."
Boeglin added that Trump's "betrayal of Americans is brazen," and noted that he could find money to bail out his political ally in Argentina but not enough to fund enhanced tax credits that help Americans pay for health insurance.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) released a video on Wednesday night that also bashed Trump for hosting an entire dinner at the White House to thank big corporate donors for funding his vanity project.
" Donald Trump has found the time to wine and dine billionaires," she said. "Oh, and apparently to carve his corporate donors' names permanently into the walls in the White House. You cannot make this up! As usual, billionaire corporations are lining up to dump money into Trump's ballroom, possibly in exchange for some favors."
I didn't know draining the swamp meant Donald Trump building a $200 million ballroom for billionaires to bend the knee for special favors. pic.twitter.com/dqKb0glyl6
— Elizabeth Warren (@SenWarren) October 16, 2025
Richard Painter, a law professor at the University of Minnesota and vice-chairman for Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, told The New York Times that the White House event honoring wealthy donors "shows what the ballroom is really all about: pay to play."
"This is payment for access," he added. "Not just to the grounds of the White House but access to the president of the United States."
Many of the attendees at the dinner were from industries that are pushing for loose regulations of artificial intelligence and other technology and companies—such as Amazon, Lockheed Martin, and Palantir—that have contracts with the federal government.
Kathleen Clark, a law professor at Washington University in St. Louis who specializes in government ethics, told the Post that the ballroom raised serious ethical concerns because "it may or not be money in his pocket, but it’s absolutely to benefit Trump personally because it’s important to him."
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Critics Say Trump 'Should Be Impeached' If He Fires US Attorney for Not Charging NY AG
"This would be another red line crossed," said one legal expert.
Sep 19, 2025
Multiple legal experts are expressing alarm at a new report that US President Donald Trump is planning to fire a federal prosecutor for failing to bring criminal charges against New York Attorney General Letitia James.
ABC News reported on Thursday night that Trump planned to fire Erik Siebert, the US attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, because he could not find sufficient evidence to conclude that James had committed mortgage fraud when she bought a home in the state in 2023.
Siebert was appointed by Trump as US attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia just four months ago, and ABC News' source said that "the administration now plans to install a US attorney who would more aggressively investigate James."
James successfully sued Trump for serial financial fraud committed by the Trump Organization back in 2023, and ultimately won a $354 million verdict against him and his business.
Trump has reportedly been pressing the Department of Justice to file charges against James in an apparent retribution campaign, and many legal experts said that going so far as to fire the US attorney investigating her would be a dangerous new step.
Joyce Vance, a former federal prosecutor and current professor at the University of Alabama School of Law, outlined why Trump firing Siebert would be damaging to the rule of law.
"This would be another red line crossed: Career prosecutors aren’t political people," she wrote on X. "They’re trained to look at the facts and the law and determine whether admissible evidence is sufficient to prove a crime. But Trump wants revenge prosecutions, whether there is evidence or not."
Anthony Foley, former head of public affairs at the US Department of Justice under President Barack Obama, marveled that Trump would fire the man whom he'd appointed simply because he came up empty trying to prosecute a political foe.
"When even the people you appoint say there’s no there there," he wrote. "Good prosecutors are trained to follow the facts... to go where the facts tell them to go. Good prosecutors don’t start investigations with a pre-determined outcome in mind."
Richard Painter, a law professor at the University of Minnesota and vice-chairman for Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, also expressed alarm and compared Trump's reported plan to "the way prosecutors are used in dictatorships—to pursue political enemies."
Brendan Nyhan, a political scientist at Dartmouth, wrote on Bluesky that Trump "should be impeached and removed from office for this alone" if he goes through with firing Siebert.
Rep. Daniel Goldman (D-NY), a former federal prosecutor, pointed the finger at his Republican colleagues whom he accused of providing cover for the president.
"You," he wrote on X, "are complicit in Trump’s actions."
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Over 70 Top Civil Servants Have Resigned in Protest Since Trump Took Office: Report
"This level of resignations in protest is without known precedent," said government watchdog Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington.
Sep 03, 2025
US President Donald Trump's second term has taken a massive toll on the American civil service, according to a new report by a government watchdog.
Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) on Wednesday released a report documenting dozens of instances in which government officials "have publicly resigned in protest after being asked to do something they believed to be illegal or in violation of their oath of office."
CREW noted that the resignations have so far impacted eight executive agencies and five independent agencies, and added that some of those who have resigned have served across as many as six presidential administrations.
"At least 19 of those who have resigned in protest have a decade or longer tenure at their agencies, with some nearing 40 years," explained CREW. "Every administration sees resignations, but this level of resignations in protest is without known precedent."
The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has been hit particularly hard by resignations and has already blown through four different commissioners in less than a year. This includes two acting IRS commissioners, Doug O'Donnell and Melanie Krause, who both resigned rather than comply with demands to hand over data on undocumented immigrants to the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
The report also examined the wave of resignations that has occurred at the US Department of Justice, beginning with Danielle Sassoon, the former interim US attorney for the Southern District of New York who stepped down after being asked to drop corruption charges against New York Mayor Eric Adams. Sassoon was followed out the door by six other attorneys who worked on the case, including its lead prosecutor.
Taken together, CREW has tallied 72 different government officials who have resigned in protest in just the first eight months of Trump's second term.
"The second Trump administration is sending a clear message to get in line or get out," commented CREW. "This approach to dissenters who refuse to obey orders that are illegal, unconstitutional, or unethical has chilling authoritarian characteristics, and stands to reshape the federal government in dangerous ways."
The most recent wave of resignations occurred last week when several top officials at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) stepped down over the firing of former CDC Director Susan Monarez, who clashed with Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on vaccination policies in the US.
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