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citizens for responsibility and ethics in washington
'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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