President-elect Donald Trump is at the center of a new legal challenge. The president-elect will become the official president on January 20, 2017. Trump’s presidency has legal experts questioning the legality of Trump’s businesses and the billionaire’s potential conflict of interest.
Experts suggest Trump’s latest hotel, situated between Pennsylvania Avenue and the White House, violates the current lease.
The hotel, at the location of the Old Post Office building, is leased to Trump by the federal government. Two federal law experts argue that Trump cannot be his own landlord when he becomes president.
The terms of the lease and ethical challenges are both in question.
A provision in the lease states, “No member or delegate to Congress, or elected official of the Government of the United States or the Government of the District of Columbia, shall be admitted to any share or part of this lease or to any benefit that may arise therefrom.”
The General Services Administration (GSA) runs the federal government’s real estate. The administration has failed to reach out to the public.
Trump signed a 60-year lease for the building in 2013. The hotel underwent extensive renovations worth up to $200 million. The hotel opened in October of 2016, just a month before the November 8 elections.
The lease states that elected government officials should not have a role in the lease.
President Trump will breach the lease agreement as president. Experts urge the GSA to terminate the lease agreement before Trump is the official president.
Trump’s transition team will appoint a new person to head the GSA, which is another conflict of interest. Trump’s transition team has not commented on the matter.
The president-elect states that his business dealings will be handed over to his children when he takes office. Experts state that the GSA, negotiating a lease agreement with the children of the President of the United States, is also a conflict of interest.
