burr, geoff
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</div><div><div>=</div><div><a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/trump-watered-down-ethics-rules-let-lobbyist-help-run-agency-he-lobbied">https://www.propublica.org/article/trump-watered-down-ethics-rules-let-lobbyist-help-run-agency-he-lobbied</a></div><div>
</div><div><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 16px; font-family: Georgia, serif; vertical-align: baseline; background: rgb(255, 255, 255); position: relative; line-height: 1.4;">Geoff Burr spent much of the last decade as the chief lobbyist for a powerful construction industry trade group. Burr <a href="http://disclosures.house.gov/ld/ldxmlrelease/2015/2A/300785714.xml" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; background: transparent; position: relative; line-height: 1; color: rgb(34, 98, 204); text-decoration-line: none;">sought to</a> <a href="http://disclosures.house.gov/ld/ldxmlrelease/2015/3A/300785720.xml" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; background: transparent; position: relative; line-height: 1; color: rgb(34, 98, 204); text-decoration-line: none;">influence</a> a host of regulations of the Department of Labor, opposing <a href="http://www.abc.org/NewsMedia/NewsReleases/tabid/144/entryid/2257/abc-celebrates-u-s-district-court-s-ruling-against-davis-bacon-expansion.aspx" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; background: transparent; position: relative; line-height: 1; color: rgb(34, 98, 204); text-decoration-line: none;">wage standards</a> for federal construction contracts and working against an <a href="http://www.abc.org/NewsMedia/NewsReleases/tabid/144/entryid/1888/abc-calls-osha-s-proposed-crystalline-silica-rule-unworkable-joins-safety-coalition-in-asking-for-withdrawal.aspx" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; background: transparent; position: relative; line-height: 1; color: rgb(34, 98, 204); text-decoration-line: none;">effort</a> to limit workers’ exposure to <a href="https://www.osha.gov/silica/" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; background: transparent; position: relative; line-height: 1; color: rgb(34, 98, 204); text-decoration-line: none;">dangerous silica dust</a>.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 16px; font-family: Georgia, serif; vertical-align: baseline; background: rgb(255, 255, 255); position: relative; line-height: 1.4;">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.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 16px; font-family: Georgia, serif; vertical-align: baseline; background: rgb(255, 255, 255); position: relative; line-height: 1.4;">In the Trump administration, Burr <a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/labor-department-hire-could-presage-collision-trump-construction-unions" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; background: transparent; position: relative; line-height: 1; color: rgb(34, 98, 204); text-decoration-line: none;">now has a top job</a> at the Labor Department.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 16px; font-family: Georgia, serif; vertical-align: baseline; background: rgb(255, 255, 255); position: relative; line-height: 1.4;">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 <a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2017/01/trump-lobbying-ban-weakens-obama-ethics-rules-234318" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; background: transparent; position: relative; line-height: 1; color: rgb(34, 98, 204); text-decoration-line: none;">watering down</a> of ethics rules in place during the Obama administration.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 16px; font-family: Georgia, serif; vertical-align: baseline; background: rgb(255, 255, 255); position: relative; line-height: 1.4;">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 <a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2017/01/trump-lobbying-ban-weakens-obama-ethics-rules-234318" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; background: transparent; position: relative; line-height: 1; color: rgb(34, 98, 204); text-decoration-line: none;">weakened</a> significant aspects of the Obama ethics policy, including scrapping a ban on lobbyists joining agencies they had recently lobbied.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 16px; font-family: Georgia, serif; vertical-align: baseline; background: rgb(255, 255, 255); position: relative; line-height: 1.4;">Ethics experts say Burr’s hiring is a troubling example of how the new administration has greased the revolving door.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 16px; font-family: Georgia, serif; vertical-align: baseline; background: rgb(255, 255, 255); position: relative; line-height: 1.4;">“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.”</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 16px; font-family: Georgia, serif; vertical-align: baseline; background: rgb(255, 255, 255); position: relative; line-height: 1.4;">It also raises questions about ambiguous language in the Trump executive order.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 16px; font-family: Georgia, serif; vertical-align: baseline; background: rgb(255, 255, 255); position: relative; line-height: 1.4;">Instead of banning lobbyists from working at agencies they lobbied, the Trump <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2017/01/28/executive-order-ethics-commitments-executive-branch-appointees" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; background: transparent; position: relative; line-height: 1; color: rgb(34, 98, 204); text-decoration-line: none;">pledge</a>, which has to be signed by all executive appointees, imposes restrictions on what such officials can work on. Specifically it says they cannot “participate in any particular matter on which I lobbied … or participate in the specific issue area in which that particular matter falls.”</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 16px; font-family: Georgia, serif; vertical-align: baseline; background: rgb(255, 255, 255); position: relative; line-height: 1.4;">Ethics lawyers are now puzzling over what exactly that language means.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 16px; font-family: Georgia, serif; vertical-align: baseline; background: rgb(255, 255, 255); position: relative; line-height: 1.4;">That task is made more confusing because of an apparent error in the Trump executive order: It says the phrase “particular matter” has the “same meaning as set forth in section 207 of title 28, United States Code.”</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 16px; font-family: Georgia, serif; vertical-align: baseline; background: rgb(255, 255, 255); position: relative; line-height: 1.4;">That part of the U.S. code <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/28/part-I" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; background: transparent; position: relative; line-height: 1; color: rgb(34, 98, 204); text-decoration-line: none;">does not exist</a>.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 16px; font-family: Georgia, serif; vertical-align: baseline; background: rgb(255, 255, 255); position: relative; line-height: 1.4;">There is a definition for that term in section 207 of <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/207" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; background: transparent; position: relative; line-height: 1; color: rgb(34, 98, 204); text-decoration-line: none;">title <span style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-style: oblique; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; background: transparent; position: relative; line-height: 1;">18</span></a>. (The error is doubly strange because much of the Trump executive order was <a href="http://www.npr.org/2017/01/28/512201631/trumps-executive-order-on-ethics-pulls-word-for-word-from-obama-clinton" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; background: transparent; position: relative; line-height: 1; color: rgb(34, 98, 204); text-decoration-line: none;">copied</a> word for word from an earlier Obama order. The White House didn’t respond to a request for comment.)</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 16px; font-family: Georgia, serif; vertical-align: baseline; background: rgb(255, 255, 255); position: relative; line-height: 1.4;">While it was cited incorrectly, the phrase “particular matter” does have a clear legal meaning, which has been <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3458555-OGE-particular-matter-guidance.html#document/p8" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; background: transparent; position: relative; line-height: 1; color: rgb(34, 98, 204); text-decoration-line: none;">detailed</a> by the Office of Government Ethics.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 16px; font-family: Georgia, serif; vertical-align: baseline; background: rgb(255, 255, 255); position: relative; line-height: 1.4;">Another phrase in the Trump order, “specific issue area,” was also used in the Obama <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3458515-Obama-ethics-order-2009.html#document/p1/a337847" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; background: transparent; position: relative; line-height: 1; color: rgb(34, 98, 204); text-decoration-line: none;">order</a> but its meaning is unclear.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 16px; font-family: Georgia, serif; vertical-align: baseline; background: rgb(255, 255, 255); position: relative; line-height: 1.4;">“It is not defined in the Trump pledge. There’s uncertainty within the government and outside the government about what that particular term means,” said Robert Walker, an ethics lawyer at Wiley Rein in Washington. “The same lack of clarity was a problem with the Obama pledge in this area."</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 16px; font-family: Georgia, serif; vertical-align: baseline; background: rgb(255, 255, 255); position: relative; line-height: 1.4;">Because the Obama pledge included a blanket ban on lobbyists joining agencies they recently lobbied, the ambiguity of the restrictions on what lobbyists could do was less urgent.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 16px; font-family: Georgia, serif; vertical-align: baseline; background: rgb(255, 255, 255); position: relative; line-height: 1.4;">The Obama administration was criticized for issuing a <a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2015/12/barack-obama-revolving-door-lobbying-217042" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; background: transparent; position: relative; line-height: 1; color: rgb(34, 98, 204); text-decoration-line: none;">handful of waivers</a> to allow former lobbyists to join the administration, thus skirting its own lobbyist ban. Out of thousands of appointees, there were five such waivers over the course of the Obama administration. None were at the Department of Labor.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 16px; font-family: Georgia, serif; vertical-align: baseline; background: rgb(255, 255, 255); position: relative; line-height: 1.4;">Because Trump weakened the Obama rules, he won’t have to issue waivers in such situations. But if Trump issues a waiver allowing, say, a former lobbyist to work directly on issues that he lobbied on, we may not even find out about it: The executive order <a href="http://www.citizensforethics.org/trump-ethics-pledge-explained/" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; background: transparent; position: relative; line-height: 1; color: rgb(34, 98, 204); text-decoration-line: none;">removed</a> the mechanism for public disclosure of such waivers....</p></div><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"></font></p></div>