You're listening to Bloomberg Law with June Grasso and Greg Store. Donald Trump's election has turned the previously obscure Emoluments Clause into one of the hottest subjects in constitutional law. The emoluments Clause says that US government officials can't accept things of value from foreign governments and their leaders. It's suddenly important because of Donald Trump's worldwide business interests and the potential that foreign officials may try to ingratiate themselves with
the new president. Bloomberg Bona's Crack. Supreme Court reporter Kimberly Robinson just delved into the topic with a new story titled five Things you Didn't Know about the Emoluments Clause. She's here with me in our point one Washington Studios. Hello, Kimberly. There were certainly at least a couple of things in your article that I didn't know. Uh, start wherever you want. What what's one thing we might not know about the
monuments Clause? Well, I think one thing that was interesting for me um is that in the two plus the years that the Supreme Court has been operating, it's never once examined this gope or application of the clause. In fact, it's only actually cited the language of the clause in three cases now. Historians say that probably has a lot to do with the fact that presidents have tried to really distance themselves from their business interests to avoid even
the appearance of impropriety. And I recently read an article from the Carter administration where he insisted that he distance himself from his peanut farm. Um. So it hasn't been an issue for the Supreme Court um. But who knows, maybe maybe we'll see a new claus there. One of your points, Kimberly, is that it might not even apply to the president, and that's the position that Trump has
been taking. Well, that's right. There's a line of thinking that you know, it only applies to officers of the United States who were appointed and not those who were elected. And I think one of the strongest supports for that argument is the fact that, you know, our first president, George Washington actually did accept a number of valuable gifts um from from the Prince of Prince um, and so that kind of suggests that it doesn't it doesn't apply
to the presidency. Kimberly, First of all, I think we should see how many former presidents we can name in this segment. We've gotten a Jimmy Carter and George Washington. Let me take you back to eighteen. I believe it is. There's a constitutional amendment having to do with this that that had had a fascinating twist. Tell us about it, right, So, the thirteenth Amendment of our Constitution almost said that people who violate the the emoluments clause are actually going to
be stripped of their U S citizenship. Now, I mean that's a pretty intellectually simulating thing to think of your president potentially being stripped of their citizenship. But I think it's especially interesting in light of, um, some ways that Donald Trump made on Twitter earlier this week, UM suggesting that you know, flag burners should be punished and should be stripped of their citizenship. Seems like the President elect may himself have once been at risk of losing his citizenship.
And that amendment almost almost became part of the constitution. Right, it was just what one state, Sure, it was just one stage short, but we got a pretty good runner up in the in the you know quote new thirteenth Amendment, Um, you know that abolished labor. So we've had a good Consolation Prize. You know, I didn't realize that there was a question about Obama accepting the Nobel Peace Prize because of the ten million Swedish Crowner attached to it. That's right.
That yeah, just you know, a year into his presidency, he was awarded this prestigious award, but there was a question whether or not he could accept it because there is this equivalency at one point four million dollar prize. Uh So, even though the Supreme Court itself hasn't been in the business of interpreting the emoluments clause, the Department of Justice has and they actually wait in here and said, you know, it's not a violation for President Obama to
accept the prize because it wasn't from a foreign government. Um. So they really separated the Nobel Prize Committee and the foreign government itself. So then, Kimberly, does that mean that they have they do consider applying it to presidents. Yeah. I think that's that's really the majority of view. Um. But you know, once again, the Supreme Court hasn't decided, so it is still an open issue. Kimberly, let me let me veer from your list and ask you one
one issue with the emoluments Clause. Uh, is whether even if Donald Trump does violated, whether there's any way that could make its way into court, whether anybody would have standing to challenge something that he he does. Uh, what's your take on that? What are you hearing from? People? Well? Right, so the Supreme Court has come up with all different rules about who can sue you know whom in court, and you really have to have a unique interest, um or a unique injury in order to be able to sue.
And it's it's hard to tell how any one citizen could have, you know, a unique enough interest to sue Donald Trump for a violation of the emoluments clause. There's there's been some argument that maybe um, businesses that compete with Donald Trump's this is might be able to do it. Um. But we again, we really don't know. And it seems like maybe the remedy might have to be a political one. And that plays into your fifth point about Hillary Clinton.
And but by the way, I never in my life expected all this talk about the emoluments clause in the public. It's it's just an amazing uh sort of turn. Well, that's right. So Hillary Clinton found herself entangled with the emoluments clause, um, but not the foreign and not the foreign memoluments clause, but the domestic one um. And that was when she was a senator and approved a salary increase for Secretary of State. And that's happened a few times.
We want to thank our guest, Kimberly Robinson of BNA, the Supreme Court Reporter, Thank you for being here. That is it for this edition of Bloomberg Law. We will be back tomorrow thanks to our technical director Reginald Basil and our producer uh Mark Sinis Cauchy. You can find more legal news at Bloomberg Law dot com and Boomberg BNA dot com, plus an invaluable website for the legal community at Big Law Business dot com. Coming up on
Bloomberg Radio, Bloomberg Markets with Carol Masster and Corey Johnson. Carol, what are you talking about today? Well, we're gonna take everybody to Indianapolis because Donald Trump he's kicking off his thank you tour, but he's also going to talk about some jobs being saved in the US at the Carrier Corporation. So we'll take everybody there live back to you guys. Okay, stay tuned for all that and more here on Bloomberg Radio. This is Bloomberg