The article by Reuters featured on BBC covers on Donald Trump’s potential conflict of interest as the US president. The author observes that, Trump has interests in real estate, brands and other engagements, and as the head of state, he is likely to influence the US government agencies and policy to his advantage (Reuters, 2017). Trump, just as his predecessors, is supposed to appoint trustees to head his investments to avoid any issue of corruption. As pointed out in the article, although he has left his investments in the hands of his two adult sons, it is still not enough. Notably, Trump retains interest in ensuring his companies are progressing well (Reuters, 2017). Clearly, his actions amount to a conflict of interest. Experts in ethics believe that President Trump should liquidate all his businesses to avoid showing a conflict of interest. Obviously, he will tend to influence public policies to serve his business interests.
In view of the article, it becomes clear that laws should be made to ensure government officials; president and vice-president avoid engaging in activities likely to spark conflict of interest. History indicates the Congress has faced numerous challenges in drafting laws on conflict of interest, in their attempt to avoid issues on power separation (Reuters, 2017). However, reports indicates that even presidents understand the dangers posed by openly showing personal interests in public finances or otherwise. In the case of Trump, he does not seem to put much focus on the issue. Its alleged that, he has used his presidential powers to influence his interests in hotel business, stocks, foreign holdings, Indonesia, china, Argentina, Canada, Dominican republic, Georgia, India, Japan, Philippines, Saudi Arabia and Taiwan among others (Reuters, 2017). For instance, Trump has interests in the 40 Wall Street and when investigations were commenced on security fraud, he appointed Jay Clayton to head SEC, even when there were allegations on him for ties to Wall Street firms.
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References
Reuters (2017). Donald Trump: A list of potential conflicts of interest. Retrieved from <https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-38069298>
