US ethics chief blasts Trump plan to keep business profits

WASHINGTON (AP) — The director of the federal government's ethics agency Wednesday blasted President-elect Donald Trump's plan to maintain his business empire by turning it over to his sons instead of selling off all his corporate assets and placing remaining profits in a government-approved blind trust.

U.S. Office of Government Ethics Director Walter Shaub took the rare step of commenting publicly about a presidential ethics decision, warning that Trump's solution to a potential cascade of conflicts spurred by his global business holdings breaks 40 years of precedent by presidents from both parties.

[...] while lawyers for several Trump picks, including prospective Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and senior adviser Jared Kushner, have worked closely with the OGE in shaping divestiture plans, Trump's own lawyers and aides gave the federal agency no official advance notice of his plan to turn over his global empire to his sons, according to an official familiar with interactions between the two sides.