Donald Trump almost shaped his potential cabinet of billionaires, the son-in-law Jared Kushner became his senior adviser. This controversial appointment looks like nepotism and leads to the violation of the Washington law.
On Monday, the President-elect appointed the husband of his daughter a senior adviser in the incoming White House team. Even if Donald Trump never gives up, he undoubtedly laid a solid base of potential conflicts of interest and accusations of nepotism.
Jared Kushner is not only a husband of Trump’s daughter Ivanka but a millionaire too. His new post in the team of President ties him a web of certain obligations. Now, the 35-year-old Kushner will need to argue that a federal anti-nepotism law does not apply to him.
The nepotism law was enacted in 1967, that time John F. Kennedy appointed his brother as Attorney general, prohibits any federal official from hiring family members to an agency or office which he or she leads.
Trump about new appointment of Jared Kushner
Trump’s transition team said that Kushner had ‘formed an effective leadership team’ with the other key persons. However, the ethics experts insist that Kushner could retain a technically unofficial role like a ‘consultant’, in order to skirt the law.
Trump’s incoming team demonstrates inarguable argument that Kushner ‘has chosen to forego his salary while serving in the administration’. Sounds pretty weak for the President team and doesn’t explain a nepotism law violation at all.
Donald Trump uses Hillary Clinton’s work in the White House in the 1990s as a precedent. According to Trump’s vision, that time Mrs Clinton could work in government because she already held an official title, the First lady of the US.
