Frosh talks legal action against Trump, EPA during Salisbury visit

Maryland Attorney General Brian Frosh's job is to fight corruption and protect the state’s citizens.

Some of what the office does get little notice, but a recent federal lawsuit alleging President Trump’s business dealings are violations of the Constitution’s foreign and domestic emoluments clauses gained Frosh national attention.

“It’s our country’s original anti-corruption law,” he said in an interview with The Daily Times during a recent visit to Salisbury.

Specifically, the Foreign Emoluments Clause bars foreign powers from influencing or inducing the president with money or other items of value. The Domestic Emoluments Clause prevents individual states from competing against each other by giving the president money or other things of value.

Frosh and District of Columbia Attorney General Karl A. Racine filed the suit in June claiming, among other things, that Trump’s business dealings compete with other businesses in Washington and the Maryland suburbs for hotel rooms and conferences.

Trump, according to the lawsuit, also is in violation of the foreign emoluments clause because his company does business in many foreign countries and his hotel in Washington markets itself to foreign diplomats. As a result, Frosh believes his business dealings are affecting U.S. foreign policy.

“We think it’s a very clear case,” he said of the lawsuit.

The case in U.S. District Court is one of four lawsuits filed against Trump all claiming he is in violation of the emoluments clauses. Suits have been filed by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington; Cork, a popular restaurant and events venue in Washington; and nearly 200 Democratic members of Congress in a case led by Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut.

The suit filed by Frosh and Racine is still awaiting a response from the Trump administration, which Frosh is expecting by the end of September.

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Frosh, a Democrat serving his first term as attorney general, also has gone after the federal Environmental Protection Agency, which he believes is being dismantled under the leadership of Administrator Scott Pruitt, leading to “an assault on clean air and clean water.”

In June, Frosh joined a coalition of 14 attorneys general and the city of Chicago in filing a motion in the U.S. Court of Appeals to intervene in a lawsuit against Pruitt’s actions to halt regulation of leaks of greenhouse gas emissions and other harmful air pollutants from new sources in the oil and gas industry.

The motion to intervene in Clean Air Council v. Pruitt is in support of a group of environmental organizations seeking to immediately stop the EPA’s administrative stay of a rule that would prevent emissions of thousands of tons of methane, smog-forming volatile organic compounds and hazardous air pollutants including benzene and formaldehyde.

Last month, Frosh also joined a coalition of six attorneys general in taking legal action against the EPA over a toxic pesticide shown to harm children’s neurological development after Pruitt took action that allowed the continued use of chlorpyrifos on food crops.

Chlorpyrifos, according to the lawsuit, is shown to negatively impact proper development and functioning of the central nervous system and brain.

Frosh said he also is anticipating there will be litigation on the EPA’s efforts to do away with rules that protect wetlands.

Closer to home, the Office of the Attorney General spends a lot of its time and effort on its consumer protection program, which handles about 10,000 calls per year from Maryland residents who are in disputes with landlords, contractors, used car sellers and others.

A team of volunteers field calls from all over the state and work to mediate disputes, Frosh said. Last year, the program recovered $9 million, with $1 million going to Eastern Shore residents.

“It’s an extraordinarily effective program,” he said.

A few weeks ago, Frosh’s office also was successful in getting indictments against two doctors and nine others for the alleged unlawful distribution of controlled dangerous substances, and operating as “pill mills.”

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A pill mill is a physician’s office, clinic or health care facility that routinely engages in the practice of prescribing and dispensing controlled dangerous substances outside the scope of professional practice and without legitimate medical purpose.

According to the indictments, Kofi Shaw-Taylor is responsible for the death of two people.

The indictment also alleges that Hasan Babaturk dispensed and prescribed drugs including oxycodone, oxymorphone, fentanyl and Xanax from his vehicle.

He also plans to tackle price gouging by manufacturers of generic prescription drugs, which he said have skyrocketed by as much as 5,000 percent in recent years. He promoted legislation that passed in the Maryland General Assembly that authorizes the attorney general to go after “unconscionable price increases.” The measure takes effect Oct. 1.

Frosh, who was elected in 2014, said he has not made a formal announcement about any re-election plans in 2018, but indicated he is interested in continuing in office.

“I look forward to doing this for a while,” he said.

Twitter: @LizHolland5