Elizabeth Warren on Monday unveiled a significant expansion of her plan to improve the behavior of public servants and root out Washington corruption.
It was the latest detailed set of policy prescriptions from the Massachusetts senator, who has seen her standing in the top tier of Democratic presidential hopefuls solidify in recent weeks — a signal that the frail state of government ethics is guaranteed to have a place among the issues being addressed in the 2020 campaign.
"Make no mistake about it: The Trump administration is the most corrupt administration of our lifetimes," Warren wrote in a post on Medium that's now part of her campaign website. "But these problems did not start with Donald Trump. They are much bigger than him — and solving them will require big, structural change to fundamentally transform our government."
While anti-corruption proposals are not new to Warren's expansive policy-rich campaign platform, her new, broad plan for reform addressing all three branches of the federal government builds on a relatively narrow array of things she'd previously promised to tackle if elected.
The senator has previously promised to press for legislation setting a lifetime ban on lobbying by former members of Congress, requiring presidents and presidential candidates to release their tax returns and implementing a code of ethics for the Supreme Court.
Monday's announcement details more than 30 additional proposals related to increasing transparency and accountability, restricting lobbying, airing out financial conflicts of interest and strengthening government ethics. Warren asserted it would be "the most sweeping set of anti-corruption reforms since Watergate."
Among the proposals:
- Curtail insider trading in Congress by tightening regulations on political intelligence firms.
- Ban government officials from trading individual stocks while in office.
- Install limits on when lobbyists may take on government roles.
- Require more detailed public disclosure of financial activities and potential conflicts of interest by federal judges.
- Impose a tax on entities that spend more than $500,000 a year on lobbying.
- Establish a new government office to investigate ethics violations.
Several of the proposals are already included in HR 1, the sweeping campaign finance regulation, election administration and ethics overhaul bill passed by the House this spring but sidelined indefinitely in the GOP Senate — even though it's cosponsored by every Democratic senator. That means that, on paper at least, five of Warren's rivals already support much of what she's proposed: Bernie Sanders, Amy Klobuchar, Cory Booker, Kamala Harris and Michel Bennet.
Throughout her plan, Warren cites Trump and his administration as some of the worst offenders — terming the president "a walking conflict of interest" — while also making clear her view that the problem predates him and is bigger than him.
Corruption is "at the root of the major problems we face as a democracy," Warren wrote, and most be addressed early in the next administration because otherwise all the other top-of-mind public policy challenges — climate change, health care, gun control and education among them — will remain impossible to tackle.
"I believe that we can root out corruption in Washington. I believe we must make big, structural changes that will once again restore our trust in government by showing that it can work for all of us," Warren said.
The expanded platform was to be the topic of a speech Monday night in New York, near the site of the former Triangle Shirtwaist Factory, where a fire 108 years killed nearly 150 workers and led to a many of the workplace safety reforms of the 20th century.
Trump posted a series of tweets on Monday that, while not rebutting the Warren plan by name, took issue with his political opponents for suggesting he's conflicted by his business interests.
"Democrats are trying to build a case that I enrich myself by being President," he tweeted. "Good idea, except I will, and have always expected to, lose BILLIONS of DOLLARS for the privilege of being your President - and doing the best job that has been done in many decades."
A golden tray sits on the Resolute Desk as President Donald Trump speaks during an announcement on American nuclear innovation in the Oval Office at the White House on July 24, 2026, in Washington, D.C. Trump is signing multiple executive orders targeting the nuclear energy sector and easing rules for new reactors and nuclear fuel supply chains.
Trump’s hubris rivals the fallen heroes of ancient Greek mythology
In January, the New York Times asked President Donald Trump if there were any limits on his global powers.
“Yeah,” the president responded, “there is one thing. My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.”
That was eight months ago, but fortunately Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster adaptation of “The Odyssey” has made ancient Greek literature newly relevant. Before that window closes, I’d like to talk about hubris.
Today, the term mostly means excessive pride or arrogance. That’s part of what the Greeks meant by it too, but the meaning was a bit richer and more specific. Hubris was an insolent or outrageous act that offended the gods, often because the transgressor was claiming abilities or authorities that solely belonged to supreme beings.
Nolan renamed and slightly modified the concept of xenia for the film, calling it “Zeus’ law.” In the director’s telling, mortals should follow the rules laid out by the gods, specifically the requirement to treat strangers with respect lest they be gods in disguise.
In a sense, hubris is the opposite, or at least the rejection, of xenia. The hubris of the suitors, and at times Odysseus himself, invites punishment by the gods and their mortal instruments.
Which brings me back to Donald Trump. His claim that there are no constraints on his personal power to dictate events on the global stage was one of the greatest expressions of hubris ever uttered by a political leader.
Trump’s claim was obviously false when he made it.
He vowed that he could end the Russia-Ukraine war in 24 hours. He’s proved powerless to make that happen. If he had divine powers to work his will, why would he have balked at implementing his tariffs so often that Wall Street adopted the “TACO trade” term for his deals? “TACO” stands for “Trump always chickens out.”
And why would Trump have made so many embarrassing concessions to China — from rescinding tariffs on Chinese goods to allowing them to buy crucial and incredibly valuable computer chips?
But Trump saw his success at capturing Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro as proof of his ability to launch missiles to the same effect as Zeus’ lightning bolts. Trump believed he was the most powerful man who ever lived.
This is no exaggeration. In March, when the Iran invasion seemed successful, Trump gave a document penned by“Presidential Historian David King” to New York Times reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan purporting to prove that Trump was “the most powerful person to have EVER walked this planet.” King was, in fact, a businessman and occasional caddy for legendary golfer Gary Player.
King compared Trump favorably to many of history’s most powerful, and often heinous, figures: Alexander the Great, Attila the Hun, William the Conqueror, Napoleon Bonaparte, Joseph Stalin, Genghis Khan, Mao Tse Tung, Adolf Hitler and Vladimir Lenin. Many of these men thought they were the most powerful person in the world, too. And many were defeated precisely because they believed it.
At least Napoleon and Hitler had a string of truly impressive victories before they learned the folly of hubris. The limits on Trump’s power have been exposed by far less august forces than the combined might of the allies in World War II or the fearsome Russian winter.
Iran is a comparatively middling power. But the regime’s ability to absorb punishment while imposing its will on the Strait of Hormuz has proved to be a greater constraint on Trump’s power than his morality or mind. We should note that, at least rhetorically, his morality has not proved much of a constraint. He has repeatedly promised to destroy Iranian “civilization” if the regime refuses to capitulate.
But they haven’t — and won’t anytime soon — because the regime’s tolerance for pain far outstrips Trump’s. The combined fear of skyrocketing oil prices, outrage of Gulf state potentates, diminishing weapon supplies and domestic unpopularity is doing the work that international law, congressional oversight and the collective opinion of foreign policy experts can’t or won’t do.
If I considered Trump more heroic than reason and facts could allow, I would say his Sisyphean predicament has the whiff of Greek tragedy to it. Trump is vexed by the fact that the Iranians won’t honor deals or ratify his countless premature claims of victory — giving new meaning to his vow that his presidency would make people tired of winning. It’s almost like they’re out-Trumping Trump.
Things might have gone better if he’d heeded that great Greek tragedian Sophocles: “For Zeus utterly abhors the boasts of a proud tongue.”
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Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.