Skip to content
Search

Latest Stories

Top Stories

Watchdogs want to extend limits on board service by House members

Watchdogs want to extend limits on board service by House members

GOP Rep. Chris Collins of New York at his August 2018 arraignment on insider trading charges.

Spencer Platt/Getty Images

The prohibition on House members serving as directors of outside groups should include nonprofit and private company boards, not only publicly traded enterprises, three prominent watchdog groups say.

The House has barred its members from such corporate boards only since January. The new Democratic majority changed the rules largely in response to the case of Republican Rep. Chris Collins of New York, charged a year ago with fraud, conspiracy and lying to the FBI in an alleged insider stock trading scheme involving Innate Immunotherapeutics, a biotech company where he was a board member. (Collins was re-elected last fall and is set to go on trial in February.)

The rules change resolution also set up a pair of House members to help the Ethics Committee recommend by the end of the year whether members and their aides should also be restricted from holding other outside positions.


Craig Holman of Public Citizen, a progressive consumer and democracy reform advocacy group, told the panel that House members holding board positions at private entities pose a widespread risk of conflicts of interest. He cited unpublished reporting by The New York Times that at least 60 members sit on the boards of private companies, most of which are limited liability corporations.

Sign up for The Fulcrum newsletter

"I would like to again urge you to go a little further than banning members from sitting on publicly owned corporate boards," he said at a hearing in late July. "The same types of conflicts of interest apply to for-profit corporations. And so, I encourage you to take a look at extending the ban to for-profit corporations across the board."

That recommendation was also endorsed in a written statement from Issue One, a cross-partisan political reform group. (It is incubating, but journalistically independent from, The Fulcrum)

Susan Wild of Pennsylvania, the Democrat on the working group, said she was "very concerned" about members' relationship to LLCs. At a minimum, she said she would propose that all partners in such entities be disclosed on congressional financial disclosures.

Donald Sherman, deputy director at Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), said the potential for conflicts of interest also applies to positions at closely held companies.

CREW, Public Citizen and Issue One also asked the committee to consider restricting members from taking board positions at nonprofit organizations, specifically those that lobby the federal government, receive public funds or engage in "dark money" spending to influence elections.

Delaney Marsco, an ethics attorney at Campaign Legal Center, said the new rule banning positions at publicly traded companies was an "important first step" but urged the House to go further, including a ban on members holding positions at companies with federal contracts.

Other recommendations to the working group included further restricting congressional stock trading or ownership. But the Republican member, Van Taylor of Texas, reminded the witnesses that the panel's charge was limited to studying outside positions.

Read More

U.S. President Donald Trump walks towards Marine One on the South Lawn on May 1, 2025 in Washington, DC.

U.S. President Donald Trump walks towards Marine One on the South Lawn on May 1, 2025 in Washington, DC.

Getty Images, Andrew Harnik

Trump’s First 100 Days on Trial

100 Days, 122 Rulings

Presidents are typically evaluated by their accomplishments in the first 100 days. Donald Trump's second term stands out for a different reason: the unprecedented number of executive actions challenged and blocked by the courts. In just over three months, Trump issued more than 200 executive orders, targeting areas such as climate policy, civil service regulations, immigration, and education funding.

However, the most telling statistic is not the volume of orders but the judiciary's response: over 120 rulings have paused or invalidated these directives. This positions the courts, rather than Congress, as the primary institutional check on the administration's agenda. With a legislature largely aligned with the executive, the judiciary has become a critical counterbalance. The sustainability of this dynamic raises questions about the resilience of democratic institutions when one branch shoulders the burden of oversight responsibilities.

Keep ReadingShow less
U.S. President Donald Trump signs executive orders in the Oval Office at the White House on April 23, 2025 in Washington, DC.

U.S. President Donald Trump signs executive orders in the Oval Office at the White House on April 23, 2025 in Washington, DC.

Getty Images, Chip Somodevilla

Trump 2.0’s Alleged Trifecta Crisis

On July 25, 1933, President Franklin D. Roosevelt gave a radio address to 125 million Americans in which he coined the term “first 100 days.” Today, the 100th day of a presidency is considered a benchmark to measure the early success or failure of a president.

Mr. Trump’s 100th day of office lands on April 30, when the world has witnessed his 137 executive orders, 39 proclamations, 36 memoranda, a few Cabinet meetings, and numerous press briefings. In summary, Trump’s cabinet appointments and seemingly arbitrary, capricious, ad hoc, and erratic actions have created turmoil in the stock market, utter confusion among our international trade partners, and confounded unrest with consumers, workers, small business owners, and corporate CEOs.

Keep ReadingShow less
America’s Liz Truss Problem

Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom Liz Truss speaks at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) at the Gaylord National Resort Hotel And Convention Center on February 20, 2025 in Oxon Hill, Maryland.

Getty Images, Andrew Harnik

America’s Liz Truss Problem

America is having a Liz Truss moment. The problem is that America doesn’t have a Liz Truss solution.

Let me take you back to the fall of 2022 when the United Kingdom experienced its own version of political whiplash. In the span of seven weeks, no less than three Prime Ministers (and two monarchs, incidentally) tried to steer the British governmental ship. On September 6, Boris Johnson was forced to resign over a seemingly endless series of scandals. Enter Liz Truss. She lasted forty-nine days, until October 25, when she too was pushed out the black door of 10 Downing Street. Her blunder? Incompetence. Rishi Sunak, the Conservative Party’s third choice, then measured the drapes.

What most people remember of the Truss premiership is the Daily Star wager that a head of lettuce would last longer than Truss. The lettuce won. But Truss’ stint as Prime Minister—the shortest ever, I should note—holds some lessons for America today.

Keep ReadingShow less
Employees being let go, laid off, fired.
Getty Images, mathisworks

Part One, The Impact of Trump’s Executive Actions: The Federal Workforce

Project Overview

This essay is part of a series by Lawyers Defending American Democracy, explaining in practical terms what the administration’s executive orders and other executive actions mean for all of us. Each of these actions springs from the pages of Project 2025, the administration's 900-page playbook that serves as the foundation for these measures. The Project 2025 agenda should concern all of us, as it tracks strategies adopted by countries such as Hungary, which have eroded democratic norms and have adopted authoritarian approaches to governing.

Keep ReadingShow less