Jeff’s post about the Trump administration’s corruption as a political issue in the midterms reminded me of something the president said at the beginning of the year. The New York Times reported on January 8:
If it was not apparent by now, President Trump made it clear in his interview with The New York Times on Wednesday that it did not bother him if his family’s global moneymaking spree this past year raised concerns about whether his financial interests were influencing his administration’s official actions.
He said his family had restrained its international business activity during his first term, specifically to allay such worries, and got nothing but criticism.
“I prohibited them from doing business in my first term, and I got absolutely no credit for it,” he said. “I didn’t have to do that. And it’s really unfair to them.”
He added, “I found out that nobody cared, and I’m allowed to.”
That was not a crazy reaction to his first term. Critics raised objections to his steering government business to his resorts and hotels — remember the “emoluments clause” controversies? — but they didn’t seem to land with the public. But casting off all restraint seems to have gotten the public’s attention. And the backdrop of falling real wages and public unhappiness about the economy is very different from his first term, too.
Senate Democrats, by the way, have preserved a full transcript of that interview.