Comer, Porter target foreign earnings of presidents, family members

House Oversight Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) and Rep. Katie Porter (D-Calif.) introduced a bill Wednesday that would require presidents to make a series of disclosures about their relatives’ foreign earnings — drafting a laundry list of obligations stemming from the GOP inquiry into President Biden.

The legislation requires presidents and vice presidents to disclose anything of value received from a foreign country, whether a gift or payments, while in office and during the two years before and after. The executive would similarly have to disclose any foreign money received by their immediate family.

It also requires presidents and vice presidents to share their tax returns for the same period — a detail that would have forced former President Trump to share the filings he bucked tradition in refusing to release during his first campaign.

But the legislation does not make explicit any disclosure requirements for companies owned by family members — a detail that would aid both Trump and Biden family members who have conducted business overseas.

And it also does not require presidents or vice presidents to share tax filings of businesses they transferred to a family member in the last four years — a provision that would put Trump’s business, now under the control of his children, out of reach.

“Influence peddling is a cottage industry in Washington and we’ve identified deficiencies in current law that have led to a culture of corruption. By creating this bipartisan legislation to provide greater transparency to the financial interactions related to the office of the president and vice-president, we can ensure that moving forward American presidents, vice presidents, and their family members cannot profit from their proximity to power,” Comer said in a statement.

Porter said that “by boosting transparency and requiring additional financial disclosures, Congress can shine a light on improper conduct in the Executive Branch — or be confident that none occurred.”

Many of the requirements listed under the bill walk through the GOP investigation into President Biden, which, while accusing the president of influence peddling, has yet to demonstrate that he took any official actions to benefit his family.

For instance, the bill requires presidents and vice presidents to disclose any loans made to family members that exceed $10,000 — a nod to a loan President Biden made to his brother James Biden.

It likewise requires documentation any time a family member travels with the president or vice president, including whether the travel was connected with any business purpose. That provision comes after the GOP has been critical of rides Hunter Biden took while his father was vice president, taking trips to countries where he had business meetings.

“We’re always happy to look at Congressman Comer’s bright ideas, but on his first day in office, President Biden implemented the strictest ethics standards of any Administration in history, he has publicly released 26 years of his tax returns for the American people to see – the most of any President ever – and publicly releases his personal financial disclosures each year,” Ian Sams, White House spokesperson for oversight and investigations, said in a statement.

“So the president of course believes in the importance of presidential ethics, and he has already made clear his commitment to upholding strong ethical standards.”

The legislation also requires presidents to disclose any conflicts of interest. 

Comer’s bill comes the day after Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), the top Democrat on the panel, introduced his own legislation targeting foreign funding flowing towards top officials.

Raskin’s bill targets Trump’s flouting of the Emoluments Clause of the constitution by failing to seek Congress’s blessing before accepting foreign government money through his various businesses.

Under that bill, federal elected officials, as well as some high-ranking appointees, would have to seek congressional approval before accepting such payments both while in office as well as for two years beyond.

The legislation would apply those provisions to senior White House advisers as well, an inclusion that targets a $2 billion deal Trump son-in-law and adviser Jared Kushner made with the Saudi royal family shortly after leaving government.