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Norms recognized for decades in Washington by both parties no longer appear to apply to the Trump White House, former prosecutors and ethics lawyers say.
Feb. 17, 2025Updated 5:55 p.m. ET
The Oval Office meeting convened by President Trump brought together the most important leaders in the world of professional golf: Jay Monahan, the top executive at the PGA Tour, and, via telephone, Yasir Al-Rumayyan, the chairman of the Saudi Arabia-backed league known as LIV Golf.
The stated goal was to figure out a way to eliminate roadblocks preventing the planned merger between the rival two groups.
But the gathering earlier this month said something even more important about the Trump administration itself. Mr. Trump was not simply using the power of his office to forge an agreement — something that presidents have done for centuries. In this case, Mr. Trump was pushing a merger that relates to his own family’s financial interest.
The Trump family is a LIV Golf business partner. The family has repeatedly hosted LIV tournaments at its golf venues, including one planned in April at the Trump National Doral in Miami for the fourth year in a row.
In other words, according to half a dozen former Justice Department prosecutors and government ethics lawyers, Mr. Trump’s participation in this discussion was a brazen conflict of interest — one of a series that have played out over the past few weeks, with a frequency unlike any presidency in modern times, even in the first Trump term.
Mr. Trump has re-entered the White House with a massively expanded portfolio of business interests, some of which require government approval or regulation, others of which are publicly traded, and still others involving foreign deals.
