Republicans see the same ethically challenged complications lurking in Donald Trump’s business portfolio that Democrats are squawking about. They just think Americans don’t care about these entanglements anymore.

Indeed, the GOP is so easily dismissing Democratic threats of investigations and ethicists’ calls for divestment out of a belief that the political landscape has shifted. Voters rewarded Trump in part on the idea that success in business will equal success in government, and Republicans are therefore unwilling to encourage the president-elect to put distance between the Oval Office and Trump Tower, or between himself and the children who serve him as trusted advisers.


“This is a great test case between the pre-Trump and post-Trump worlds,” said former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, a prominent early GOP backer of the president-elect. “In a pre-Trump world dominated by left-wing ideas, anyone successful is inherently dangerous and should be punished for trying to serve the country.”

“The American people,” Gingrich added, “knowingly voted for a businessman whose name is inextricably tied to his fortune. … I’d say to the left wing, get over it.”

Trump and his army of lawyers are sorting through possible financial arrangements that might help him untangle national interests from his business interests globally, and he has scheduled a mid-December news conference with his children in New York to unveil the plan. With so many moving parts, and the prospect of a large tax bill depending on how he handles a range of real estate investments, lawyers from both parties acknowledge there are no obvious and simple answers.

But at least politically, Trump and many Republicans sense he is insulated from the heat Democrats intend to bring. He said as much himself last month amid a wave of news accounts and Democratic congressional oversight requests demanding closer scrutiny of his finances. “Prior to the election it was well known that I have interests in properties all over the world. Only the crooked media makes this a big deal!” Trump posted on Twitter.

Certainly, the Democratic attacks against Trump are coming at an awkward time from a party still scrambling to fill its own leadership vacuum in a post-Obama world, where congressional forces are mired in the minority for at least the next two years and probably four. So far, their strategy has all the trademarks of past campaign battles and shows little recognition of the new playing field that Trump just created.

Almost daily, Trump’s critics fire off letters demanding action or introducing resolutions with little chance of picking up speed. They’re circulating op-eds and news articles written by local and national news organizations that have seen their own power wane. They’re circulating petitions and videos on MoveOn.org and jamming congressional phone lines.

“It’s asinine,” Chris Wilson, a GOP strategist who ran the data and analytics shop for Ted Cruz’s presidential campaign, said of the Democratic attempts to confront Trump on his conflicts of interest.

“If there was a situation that came up in which later there was a true conflict of interest, that created a dangerous national security situation, the problem is now nobody would believe them. … They’re just jumping into it so quickly and on such a stupid issue that it’s almost embarrassing to watch.”

Trump, of course, hasn’t been sworn in yet — so much of what’s happening now lives very much in the realm of the hypothetical.

“It’s really what happens afterward,” warned Oklahoma GOP Rep. Tom Cole. “If I were anybody in Trump’s operation, I’d try to be like Caesar’s wife, totally above suspicion and know people are going to be suspicious anyway.”

At least for now, the early polling shows a divided country that’s still coming to grips with the complexities of the Trump conflicts. A CNN survey released last month found almost 60 percent of respondents saying they didn’t think Trump was going far enough with indications that he would hand over control of his company to his children. Another poll, taken before Thanksgiving by POLITICO/Morning Consult, had more than 6 in 10 respondents welcoming Trump’s children playing a large role in running their father’s company. But less than a third said they were willing to accept the idea that Trump’s family would be involved in his administration.

Democrats and a smattering of GOP voices are demanding Trump sell his whole business outright, moving his assets into a “blind trust,” like other recent presidents did, where he has no clear insight into his investments and therefore can’t direct policy in a way that would yield personal profit. What’s more, they insist Trump needs to remove his children from the White House and no longer include them in his transition planning and in meetings with foreign officials and other people who will be involved in his government decision making.

Trump’s supporters, however, see little reason to make such dramatic changes.

“You can’t take Trump as a name and a $10 billion system and hide it. It’s just stupid,” Gingrich said. He’s urging Trump to turn the company over to his children and establish a panel of three to five people who meet monthly and review the company’s activities “and make sure in no way it’s being used to the advantage of Trump.”

Republicans who fought Trump during the campaign saw the same signs among voters — the conflict issue isn’t one they cared much about.

“His brand perception as a successful businessman was too strong,” said Tim Miller, a former Jeb Bush spokesman. “If we had a full year and put big money behind it, could we have changed that? Who knows? But during the small window we were working in, we saw no movement.”

Clinton’s campaign made the most overt swipes at Trump over his business dealings, urging him to disclose foreign ties and divest from his company, highlighting news reports and issuing statements chronicling ethical problems and how the Republican used his campaign as a platform to market his businesses.

President Barack Obama even got in on the action, telling Al Sharpton in an MSNBC interview just days before the election that Trump’s intention to avoid a blind trust while letting his family run the company raised too many questions because “he's got all kinds of business interests that nobody knows what's what and where money is coming from and where it might be going.”

“That is the kind of unprecedented attitude with respect to the highest office in the land that would make me concerned about the country as a whole,” Obama said.

GOP congressional leaders have largely shunned questions on Trump. “I don’t have any advice to offer him today,” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell told reporters last week. Added House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, “I take anything in the Constitution very seriously. I don’t want to leave any misinterpretation to you. But I’m just saying, he hasn’t been sworn in yet.”

Utah GOP Rep. Jason Chaffetz, chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, said in an interview that Trump was “moving in the right direction” with his signal that the company will be “more than arm’s length away.”

Trump has argued he’s not legally required as president to deal with his conflicts, and Chaffetz repeated that assessment. “There are public perceptions that I’m sure they’re keenly aware of,” he said.

Trump’s feet will be held to the fire should his business interests become a problem, Chaffetz promised. But he also argued Democrats are going overboard by flogging an issue that remains hypothetical.

“It is a little ridiculous to send me six letters before he’s even been sworn in to go on, essentially, fishing trips,” he said. “That’s not what we do.”