“No Title of Nobility shall be granted by the United States: And no Person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under them, shall, without the Consent of the Congress, accept of any present, Emolument, Office, or Title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince, or foreign State.”
Notwithstanding capitalization, punctuation, and syntax that may seem peculiar today, what it very clearly says is that the president of the United States abso- lutely may not accept any gift from another country or its ruler unless Congress approves it.
As he has with so many laws, Donald Trump has repeatedly violated both the letter and the spirit of the Emoluments Clause. Even so, Trump’s latest salvo in an ongoing campaign of open disdain for the clause is as flagrant as it is unsurprising.
Here’s what one of us (Robert) told the national media:
“Trump’s plan to accept a luxury plane from Qatar is blatantly unconstitutional. The concern with foreign gifts is that they can sway a presi- dent’s policy and predilections — and there’s little doubt that Qatar wants to gift Trump a ‘palace in the sky’ for exactly that reason. Even in a presidency defined by grift, this move is shocking. It makes clear that U.S. foreign policy under Trump is up for sale. The juxtaposition with cancelled foreign aid grants and programs for poor and vulnerable people — cancellations that will cost millions
of lives unless reversed — could not be starker or more morally grotesque.”
By the way, Qatar spews more climate threatening carbon dioxide per capita than any other country on Earth. Does giving Trump hundreds of millions have something to do with that?
The American people are right to be morally offended and furiously opposed to the rank corruption on display here — which is as plain (or should we say “plane”?) as the nose on Trump’s face.
Tell Congress: To ac- cept the “gift” of a 747 jumbo jet worth more than $400 million from the Qatari royal family would be a new low even for someone as morally ungrounded, awash in corruption, and easily bought as Donald Trump. Congress must use its full authority over emoluments to reject what is essentially a naked attempt at brib- ing the president of the United States.
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Thanks for taking action. For progress,
– Robert Weissman & Lisa Gilbert, Co-Presidents of Public Citizen
