{"id":1407080,"date":"2022-03-29T11:45:10","date_gmt":"2022-03-29T15:45:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1407080"},"modified":"2022-03-29T11:45:19","modified_gmt":"2022-03-29T15:45:19","slug":"conflicts-of-interest-for-senior-appointees-and-federal-officials-must-be-public-watchdog-demands","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/conflicts-of-interest-for-senior-appointees-and-federal-officials-must-be-public-watchdog-demands\/","title":{"rendered":"Conflicts of Interest For Senior Appointees and Federal Officials Must Be Public, Watchdog Demands"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">28<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fconflicts-of-interest-for-senior-appointees-and-federal-officials-must-be-public-watchdog-demands%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1407080&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/dw-wp-production.imgix.net\/2022\/03\/GettyImages-1239075920.jpeg?w=1200&#038;h=800&#038;ixlib=react-9.3.0\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\" alt=\"image\" \/><\/div>\n<p>On the heels of U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland issuing a <a href=\"https:\/\/protectpublicstrust.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/DOJ-OGE-Financial-Transparency-Letter.pdf\">memo<\/a> in March on Freedom of Information Act transparency, a government watchdog group is demanding the Department of Justice (DOJ) and Office of Government Ethics (OGE) publicize all financial and ethics conflicts of interest for senior appointees and federal officials.<\/p>\n<p>Protect the Public\u2019s Trust wrote to Garland and OGE Director Emory Rounds on Tuesday, citing how access to documents related to conflicts of interest are often \u201ccloaked behind walls of government forms.\u201d The watchdog takes issue with the fact that only financial disclosure reports for Senate-confirmed presidential appointees and incumbents are made public, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.oge.gov\/Web\/OGE.nsf\/accessdocs_disclosure-quickstart?OpenForm\">according<\/a> to OGE\u2019s website.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cFor any investigator versed in this arena, it\u2019s clear that the system for members of the American public to discover the information contained in financial disclosure forms is broken and in dire need of repair,\u201d the watchdog wrote. \u201cThe relevant forms cannot be obtained via the FOIA process. Even among the highest-ranking officials whose forms are posted on the OGE website it is fraught with repeated extensions granted to officials with complicated personal finances and potential conflicts of interest requiring divestiture.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>For instance, the group cites that while there are 126 <a href=\"https:\/\/www2.ed.gov\/news\/staff\/appointees.html\">listed<\/a> appointees for the Department of Education, only nine reports are currently available for public viewing. The letter comes weeks after Garland\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.justice.gov\/ag\/page\/file\/1483516\/download\">March 15<\/a> memo providing Freedom of Information Act guidelines for federal agencies and departments.<\/p>\n<p>The attorney general urged chief officers for records in agencies to undertake thorough assessments of processes and \u201ccarefully review backlogs of requests.\u201d Such backlog has been noticeable in recent years. The Department of Defense <a href=\"https:\/\/open.defense.gov\/Portals\/23\/Documents\/DoDFY2020AnnualFOIA_Report.pdf\">left<\/a> 22,412 requests pending at the end of 2020, and the DOJ\u2019s average processing time for \u201csimple requests\u201d <a href=\"https:\/\/www.justice.gov\/oip\/page\/file\/1282001\/download\">surged<\/a> from 30.22 days in 2018 to 39.30 days in 2019.<\/p>\n<p>Tom Jones, co-founder of the watchdog group American Accountability Foundation, told The Daily Wire that he thinks Protect the Public Trust is \u201cright on target\u201d about its calls for easier public access to financial disclosures. He thinks disclosures for senior government leaders ought to be swiftly available.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAs a former financial disclosure filer myself, my filings are online and easily accessible by the public, and the same should be the case for presidential appointees,\u201d said Jones. \u201cI would go a step further and maintain that financial disclosure for senior civil servants should be easily accessible. Given the influence of senior leaders in the federal government over the lives of every day Americans it is not too much to expect that we know that they\u2019re not acting to enrich themselves. \u201d<\/p>\n<p>Protect the Public\u2019s Trust is calling on agencies to provide all financial disclosure forms within 30 days of completion to OGE, followed by OGE willingly granting access to law-abiding requestors. The group says that form 278\u2019s \u2014 which are the name for the financial disclosure reports \u2013 should not be concealed so as to burden Americans seeking transparency about government employees. The watchdog is also urging the government to post a list of agency appointees, in addition to those who are Senate-confirmed.<\/p>\n<p>The DOJ did not immediately respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n<p><i>Send story tips to Gabe Kaminsky at\u00a0<\/i><a href=\"mailto:gekaminsky@protonmail.com\"><i>gekaminsky@protonmail.com<\/i><\/a><i>. Follow him\u00a0<\/i><i><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/gekaminsky\">on Twitter<\/a><\/i><\/p>\n<p><em><span>The Daily Wire is one of America\u2019s fastest-growing conservative media companies for breaking news, investigative reporting, sports, podcasts, in-depth analysis, books, and entertainment for a reason: because we believe in what we do. We believe in our country, in the value of truth and the freedom to speak it, and in the right to challenge tyranny wherever we see it. Believe the same? <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/subscribe\"><span>Become a member now and join our mission<\/span><\/a><span>. <\/span><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>On the heels of U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland issuing a memo in March on Freedom of Information Act transparency, a government watchdog group is demanding the Department of Justice<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":381,"featured_media":2315279,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1407080","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1407080","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/381"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1407080"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1407080\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2315279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1407080"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1407080"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1407080"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}