How Trump can drain the federal swamp

Donald Trump has pledged to “drain the swamp,” but I wonder if he knows just how deep down the muck goes.

Yes, he plans to close the revolving door between his administration and the lobbying firms of K Street, and that’s a good start. If you don’t do that, a top federal official is going to be paying way too much attention to the lobbying firm he expects will hire him after he leaves government, and that’s a legalized form of bribery.

President Obama made a similar pledge, and as quickly backed away from it. He said that no administration official could leave government to take up a job as a lobbyist, but exemptions were given and end runs permitted until there was little left of the pledge. Trump proposes to up the ante, by extending the ban from Obama’s two years to five years. He’d also close some of the loopholes that permitted Obama officials to work in lobbying firms without registering as lobbyists.

We need to go further, however, and extend the ban to congressmen and their staffers.

About a third of the current former congressmen and senior staffers work in corporate government relations departments or as registered lobbyists, where they trade their government contacts in return for huge salary increases.

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