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Ed. note: Welcome to our daily feature, Quote of the Day.
America voted for corruption, and that’s what Trump is delivering. Trump’s corruption and naked profiteering is so open, extreme and pervasive this time around that to comment on any one aspect of it would be to lose the forest for the trees. The very idea of government ethics is now a smoldering crater.
— Walter Shaub, former head of the Office of Government Ethics under the first Trump administration, in an email sent to CNN in the wake of then president-elect Donald Trump’s memecoin cryptocurrency going live shortly before Inauguration Day. Trump, who has now taken the reins as president, reportedly made a great deal of money on the crypto launch. Professor Richard Painter of Minnesota Law echoed Shaub’s concerns, telling CNN, “I believe it is very dangerous to have the people who are supposed to oversee regulating financial instruments investing in them at the same time. There’s no precedent for a head of state to launch a personal cryptocurrency.”
Staci Zaretsky is a senior editor at Above the Law, where she’s worked since 2011. She’d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on Bluesky, X/Twitter, and Threads, or connect with her on LinkedIn.