The vice-president-elect and incoming chief of staff promised ‘proper separation’ from White House after Trump and children met with Indian business partners

This article is more than 3 years old

This article is more than 3 years old

Donald Trump’s most senior advisers said on Sunday that he would not illegally use the White House for personal profit, as concerns mounted that he was already mixing business interests and official duties.

Trump’s vice-president-elect and chief of staff moved to reassure the public even as it emerged that he had been meeting overseas business partners between interviews for cabinet roles and making corporate pitches to foreign diplomats.

Mike Pence, the incoming vice-president, insisted on Sunday that Trump would not have conflicts of interest when he entered the White House. “I think during the presidency there will be the proper separation,” he told CBS’s Face the Nation.

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“I can assure you and all of your viewers that all of the laws pertaining to his business dealings and his service as president of the United States will be strictly adhered to,” Pence said, promising that Trump would “leave his business life in the past”.

Pence spoke after the Economic Times reported that Trump met last week in Trump Tower with three business partners who are building Trump-branded apartments in India, having said that he would hand control of his business to his adult children.



Trump’s children Eric and Ivanka also met with at least one of the Indian partners, the New York Times reported. Spokeswomen for Trump declined to say whether they had discussed Trump’s business interests in India.

The meeting at the Manhattan building, which has for months served as the headquarters both of Trump’s company and political operation, followed news that dozens of foreign diplomats attended a sales pitch last week at Trump’s new hotel in downtown Washington DC.

Ivanka Trump, who is an executive vice-president of the Trump Organization, also joined her father last week for a meeting at Trump Tower with Shinzo Abe, the prime minister of Japan. Ivanka’s jewelry company had previously advertised a $10,800 gold bracelet that she wore during a TV interview alongside her father.

The US constitution prohibits public officials from receiving anything of value from foreign governments. Richard Painter, who served as chief ethics counsel to president George W Bush, has warned that Trump risked violating the constitution’s emoluments clause unless he took action before his inauguration.

“It had better stop by January 20,” Painter told ThinkProgress.

Laurence Tribe, a professor of constitutional law at Harvard who taught Barack Obama, said on Twitter that Trump was risking legal action from business competitors if he did not move to stop the presidency benefitting him financially.

Tribe described Trump as “uniquely suable” thanks to his current corporate setup.

Trump’s attorneys have said that three of his children, Ivanka, Donald Jr and Eric, would be placed in charge of his sprawling business empire. The lawyers called this arrangement a “blind trust”, but ethics watchdogs and attorneys have noted that it is not blind, because Trump’s children remain in close contact with their father. Former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani, a close adviser to Trump and a former prosecutor, has admitted that the arrangement is not actually a blind trust.

The full extent of Trump’s corporate interests and earnings are unknown because of his refusal to release his personal tax returns, in a breach of decades in election tradition.

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The Trump children are also on his transition team, and his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, has reportedly sought legal advice about whether he can join the administration without breaking anti-nepotism laws.

Reince Priebus, the Republican official Trump has selected to serve as his White House chief of staff, also insisted on Sunday that the president-elect would put the country’s interests before his own. “His family is very important to him,” Priebus told CNN. “And while it’s unique, it’s certainly compliant with the law.



“We will have the White House counsel review all of these things and we will have every ‘I’ dotted and every ‘T’ crossed.”

Priebus said Trump’s attention to the US’s future was also why he agreed to pay a $25m settlement to the plaintiffs in three lawsuits accusing him of fraud, through his now-defunct Trump University.

“All of that history, he wants to put behind him,” Priebus said. “There are some things that are important to you and there are some things that you just decide you move on, you’re not admitting wrongdoing.” The aide called the settlement “a positive sign”.

Some of Trump’s closest advisers may also face congressional scrutiny for potential conflicts of interest. Giuliani, who has sought a top cabinet position in the Trump administration, for years lobbied and consulted for wealthy foreign clients, including for Qatar and a Canadian oil company.

Retired general Mike Flynn, named Trump’s national security adviser, also ran a consulting company with foreign clients, and made occasional appearances on Kremlin-owned TV network Russia Today.