House Judiciary Committee Democrats are opening a wide-ranging probe into President Trump’s acceptance of a luxury jet from Qatar’s royal family.
House Democrats are opening an investigation into President Donald Trump and his administration’s acceptance of a $400 million private jet from the Qatari government.
Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., the ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee, led his fellow Democrats on the panel in a letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi and White House counsel David Warrington on Thursday.
They’re specifically asking Bondi to hand over a reported legal memo she wrote that is meant to assert the legality of Trump accepting the plane on behalf of the U.S.
« Any legal memo purporting to make such a claim would obviously fly in the face of the text of the Constitution’s Foreign Emoluments Clause, which explicitly prohibits the President from accepting any ‘present [or] Emolument. of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince, or foreign State’ unless he has ‘the Consent of Congress' », the letter reads.
« Accordingly, we are writing to request that you provide the Committee on the Judiciary with these memos immediately as their analysis and conclusions are apparently the basis for the President’s decision to disregard the plain text of the Constitution. »
Raskin and the other Judiciary Committee Democrats went so far as to accuse Trump or people in his orbit of soliciting a bribe from Qatar.
« President Trump’s statements expressing displeasure with delays in the delivery of his new Boeing aircraft to serve as Air Force One and the timing of this ‘gift’ suggest that President Trump or a member of his Administration may have improperly solicited this ‘nice gesture’ from the Qatari government », the Democrats said, citing Trump’s own comments.
