It's surprising to students of the law that the average well informed American now knows about a clause in Article one, Section four of the Constitution, the Emoluments Clause, thanks to businessman President Donald Trump. The clause prohibits federal officials, certainly the president, from accepting anything of value from a foreign
government without the consent of Congress. Talk about whether Trump is violating the emoluments Clause by accepting payments from foreign governments through his business empire turned into a federal lawsuit by a DC based watchdog group in January. That lawsuit has been strengthened by the addition of two new plaintiffs, an association of restaurants and restaurant workers and a woman who books banquet halls for two DC hotels. Our guest
is Richard Painter. He's a professor at the University of Minnesota Law School and a former White House ethics lawyer. Richard does the addition of the new plaintiffs help get over the hurdle of standing to file the lawsuit, which
is the legal requirement that the plaintive actually suffered actual harm. Well, I believe that we had standing to begin with, as the citizens for responsibility and ethnics in Washington Crew because we as a nonprofit organization, worked for many years to address conflicts of interests and ethics problems in government and now have to devote substantial resources to addressing this problem
of the monuments or foreign government payoffs uh to the president. UH. So I believe we had a very strong standing argument. But these other plaintiffs have different standing arguments of economic harms to their business or to their employment from the president's receipt of business from foreign governments at his hotels,
and so we welcome them to the to the lawsuit. Uh. And we're all arguing the same uh thing with the respect of the underlying violation of the Constitution, which is the receipt of foreign government of payments and benefits by the President's businesses, which is specifically prohibited under the Constitution because the founders did not want our government officials um uh doing business and in fact with foreign governments there's just too much run for conflict of interest there, and
that's why it's prohibited at the Constitution. Richard, what is it, uh that hard to get a direct competitor of the Trump hotel aboard as a plaintiffs so this is a is an association of restaurants and restaurant workers, and a woman who books banquet halls. It would seem like the clearest case for somebody who could sue would be would be somebody who can say, you know, my business, uh, directly competes with the hotel and we're losing customers. Well,
I think the banquet halls. Uh. Uh A question here are competing banquet halls. Uh. The question is whether someone wants to bring a lot of suit against the President of United Sates, particularly a chain of hotels. That's not all what a lot of chain hotel chains are necessarily gonna want to do at this charcture. Uh. So you need someone who not only has a very good spanning argument,
but who wants to bring the suit. Richard, Lots of people in lots of organizations have been trying to get Trump to give his tax returns to reveal them to the public. Professor Larry Tribe, who is one of the lawyers on the case, said he thinks the district court will have every reason to compel disclosure of Trump's tax returns in the lawsuit. Explain why if you agree, Well, yes I do, and Larry tried Bisco Council with me
on that case. I am representing Crew on with Norman Eisen who was the former chief ethic player for President Obama. I was the former chief ethnic player for President of PLUSH. So we're all working of four Crew representing Crew in this lawsuit. And uh we do believe that the court would ask for discovery, should ask for discovery that would disclose the underlying payments made two corporations that are controlled
by the president. Uh, so we can see which faments coming from foreign governments and corporations including banks controlled by foreign governments to sovereign wealth fund. The tax returns would disclosed at least some of that information. So whether we get the tax returns or what we get comparable information that's even more comprehensive than the tax returns remains to be seen. But that's the information we believe this Judge um should be disclosed. Uh Judge Abrams and uh we
uh we were hoping she does. Thank you. Thank you. Richard Painter, professor at the University of Minnesota Law School, former White House ethics lawyer and one of the lawyers who is bringing this case for Crew, which is a
public interest organization. The plaintiffs have also beefed up that lawsuit by adding what it calls gratuitous Chinese trademarks that Trump has been granted UH A decade ago, Trump was denied trademark protection in China's Trademark office and courts, but he was granted trademark protection for a host of goods and services after he was sworn in as president.