Breaches of norms in Trump’s campaign
Former Special Secretary, Cabinet Secretariat
Under 52 US Code 30121, it is a federal offence to receive ‘contribution’ or ‘other thing of value’ from a foreign national for a federal, state or local election: “It shall be unlawful for a foreign national… to make a contribution… or something of value… in connection with a Federal… election.”
Under the US Federal Election Campaign Act (FECA), an individual would be deemed to be a candidate if he or she ‘seeks’ or ‘expected to seek nomination for election and has received contributions aggregating in excess of $5,000 or has made expenditures in excess of $5,000’. Unlike the Indian law, it is not necessary for him/her to have actually filed nomination.
Washington DC-based non-profit ‘watchdog’ organisation ‘Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington’ had filed a report, ‘A campaign to defraud’ publishing a list of eight criminal offences committed by President Donald Trump. Two of these were allegedly committed by him after his election in 2016. In another report, ‘Trump’s 2,000 conflicts of interest and continuing’, it listed: ‘one hundred eleven officials from 65 foreign governments, including 57 foreign countries, have made 137 visits to a Trump property, raising the question of how much foreign money has been spent at Trump’s properties’.
‘Contribution’ need not only be in money but includes “anything of value made by any person for the purpose of influencing any election.” A foreign leader canvassing for a federal candidate among his ethnics in America or an American candidate requesting a foreign power to intervene which might give him an indirect advantage might be construed to be violating this law.
Thus, when Trump asked Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky on July 25, 2019, to ‘look into’ former vice-president Joe Biden and his son Hunter, he had violated this campaign law as he knew that Biden would most possibly be his opponent in November 2020.
According to the transcripts declassified on September 24, 2019, Trump had said: “There’s a lot of talk about Biden’s son that Biden stopped the prosecution and a lot of people want to find out about that, so whatever you can do with the Attorney General would be great. Biden went around bragging that he stopped the prosecution, so if you can look into it… it sounds horrible to me.”
This was confirmed by Col Alexander Vindman, Ukrainian expert and Director of European Affairs in the US National Security Council, who had officially ‘listened’ to the Trump call. However, he was ‘re-assigned’ in February 2020 after he deposed at the US House of Representatives during the Trump impeachment inquiry.
John Bolton, former National Security Adviser, had also confirmed this in his book The Room Where It Happened that Trump had asked him to ensure that the Ukraine President should cater to his demand. He was also asked to call President Zelensky to request him to meet with Trump’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani who was planning to travel to Ukraine.
Similarly, President Donald Trump’s action on September 4, invoking his friendship with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and citing their joint rallies to canvass Indian-American support for his re-election, is prima facie a breach of FECA. The videos shown by the Trump Campaign include their joint rallies in the US and India. On September 22, 2019, at the Howdy Modi rally at Houston, Modi had supported Trump by calling out to the audience, ‘Abki bar Trump Sarkar’.
Trump, in turn, had underplayed the importance of any deals during his India visit and was expecting a huge campaign rally at Motera, near Ahmedabad, on February 24 this year, ostensibly to influence the Indian-Americans. On February 11, he had made his priorities clear when told a White House audience that “He (PM Modi) said we’ll have millions and millions of people.” As an afterthought, he told a rally in Las Vegas on February 20: “We’re going to India, and we may make a tremendous deal there, or maybe we’ll slow it down. We’ll do it after the election.”
The US media had already listed several recent acts by the Trump administration that were clearly against FECA and the 1939 Hatch Act which prevents federal employees from election campaign-related political activity. The 1939 Act was named after Senator Carl Hatch of New Mexico.
Among the violations was the video broadcast of the ‘Naturalisation ceremony’ for five new US citizens from different countries, including a sari-clad woman from India, at the White House and presidential pardon to a convicted bank robber. Ordinarily, such ceremonies are conducted at a lower level by a judge or by a Citizenship and Immigration official (CIS). The White House defended its publicity at the Republican National Convention (RNC) when criticism of breach of Hatch Act was made. They said that the videos had already appeared on the official CIS website!
President Trump and Vice-President Mike Pence were alleged to have violated the Hatch Act by using the White House and Fort McHenry, both government buildings, as props for their RNC speeches. Similarly, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was alleged to have made violations by speaking to the RNC from Jerusalem where he was on an official diplomatic visit. All these were brushed aside by the Trump campaign by saying that they had paid for the use of government buildings.
The real reason why such violations had occurred was because the Federal Election Commission, the election watchdog, was effectively ‘shut down’ by President Trump since August 2019 by not recommending appointments to the vacancies for Senate ratification. Under its statute, the six-member commission has to have a quorum of four to take all decisions. As of now, there are only three members and 350 outstanding matters are pending decisions.
In fact, ‘The Center for Public Integrity’ had warned even in August last year that by not having a quorum, the FEC ‘can’t slap political scofflaws with fines, can’t make rules, can’t conduct audits and can’t vote on outcome of investigations.’
