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Corruption, Bribery, and Public Confidence

In my graduate program, most of the PhD students shared a single communal office. At the end of the semester, when we had papers to write and exams to grade, it was common for us to do our work in the office – a show of silent solidarity and an offering of mutual moral support. On one such occasion a colleague of mine, call her M, was working in the office when one of her students came by. This student wanted to thank her for the semester and offered her a gift card.

M, however, refused the gift. The graduate students at Binghamton University are employees in the State University of New York system, thus, state employees. As part of ethics regulations in New York, state employees and elected officials are prohibited from accepting gifts of greater value than 15 dollars. I suspect that, the law aside, M may have refused the gift anyway. As educators, we were tasked with grading student materials as fair and unbiased as possible. As informed people, we were aware that factors such as the desire to reciprocate a good deed or to treat people you like well may shape judgments in unconscious ways. As philosophers who study morality, we were predisposed to have a concern for, and the ability to find, ethical violations.

On Sunday, May 11th, ABC News reported that the Trump Administration is preparing to accept a gift of a Boeing 747-8, worth about $400 million, from the Qatari royal family. The report further elaborated that the administration’s intention is to use the jet as the new Air Force One through the remainder of President Donald Trump’s term – which would require a retrofit process that could take multiple years and cost nearly one billion dollars. Ownership would be transferred to Trump’s presidential library before the end of his term, with the Air Force covering any costs associated with the transfer. When questioned on the ethical implications of accepting the plane, Trump noted that only a “stupid person” would refuse a “free, very expensive airplane.”

Critics contend that accepting the plane, particularly with the intention to transfer ownership to the Trump presidential library, would violate the Emoluments Clause of the United States Constitution. Article I, Section 9, Clause 8 of the Constitution states that “no person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under them, shall, without the Consent of Congress, accept of any present, Emolument, Office or Title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince or foreign State.” Congress has not approved receipt of the plane from the Qatari royal family and it is hard to see the plane as anything but a gift.

However, the moral critiques have been more varied than legal critiques. In its initial reporting, The New York Times said receipt of the plane “rais[es] substantial ethical issues.” Similarly, the outlet described a plan for the top holders of $TRUMP, a meme coin marketed by the President and his family, to privately dine with the President and tour the White House as a “foreign influence opportunity.” However, some other news outlets, politicians, and even Trump supporters have described these acts as bribery and corruption. Eric Lipton, reporter for The New York Times, defended his outlet’s framing, contending that “corruption requires explicit quid pro quo” thus stating that corruption is effectively only limited to bribery.

Lipton is correct, to some extent. We should be careful about how we refer to the receipt of a jet, perks for owners of the president’s cryptocurrency, and the president’s sons striking business deals across the Middle East in the days leading up to the president touring the region. Without evidence of an explicit quid pro quo – I’ll give you that if you support this policy – we cannot know for certain that these are bribes. For instance, we cannot be absolutely sure that the Trump administration reaching a deal to allow the UAE access to advanced AI chips from companies such as Nvidia was an exchange for the approval of a new Trump tower in Dubai, announced a week prior. Perhaps it is merely a coincidence.

But to limit corruption to bribery is to give an impoverished account. Bribes are a species of, not a synonym for, corruption. For instance, suppose a mayor had the final decision about which company would receive a contract to renovate a public building. Imagine that the mayor decided to award the contract to a construction company recently founded by his brother. This occurs despite contractors with a long history of successful work offering more competitive bids. This is plainly corruption, even if his brother did not offer the mayor something in exchange for this contract.

As this example shows, corruption is not just arranging quid pro quos. Corruption occurs whenever a public official/employee makes decisions based on private interests, preferences, or feelings, rather than the demands of the office/position. The mayor awards the contract to his brother, not for the good of the town, but because it aligns with his private goals. M demonstrated a lack of corruption not because her student offered the card in exchange for a good grade, but rather because accepting the gift card could affect her ability to function impartially in her role.

Of course, one might contend that accepting a gift does not necessitate that one’s private interests, preferences, or feelings will shape one’s decisions. Perhaps some individuals are especially integrous and will not let gifts sway their opinions. Indeed, one might even contend that publicly accepting gifts is a good thing – Speaker of the House Mike Johnson defended acceptance of the plane arguing, in part, that because it is happening “out in the open” there is not a cause for concern. The idea here might be that openly accepting a gift invites the public to carefully scrutinize decisions that an official makes regarding the party that gave the gift. This would not occur if the gift were a product of a backroom deal.

However, this argument misunderstands the true danger of corruption. Corruption is not a cause for concern merely if it results in decision makers endorsing policies for private reasons. This is certainly part of the issue. But the larger cause for concern surrounding corruption is that it erodes public confidence in institutions and those that occupy positions of power.

Elected officials and public employees are often referred to as public servants – they are supposed to act in the interests of the public. When they openly receive gifts or profit from decisions that they make, the public must now question all subsequent decisions that officials make. As a result, the public loses confidence that decision makers truly have their best interests at heart. This is why the appearance of impropriety or a conflict of interest is as damaging as its actual occurrence; both leave those subject to a decision uncertain that those who made that choice did so for the right reasons.

In 2024, only about 20% of Americans self-reported that they trust the government to do what is right most of the time. In this environment, civic life deteriorates; citizens no longer view the government, even a democratic one, as a cooperative project in which we all engage. They instead view it as something alien, and maybe even hostile, to the citizenry. As a result, it cannot be trusted. The true danger of corruption lies here.

Because of this, there is a sense in which an openly corrupt act is in fact worse than a secretive one. The politician who, say, takes a bribe during a backroom deal seems to acknowledge the severity of the situation. He recognizes that his act is wrong or at least will hurt his public image. Hence its secrecy. But the public figure who openly engages in corrupt acts believes that his acts are not inappropriate or that they will not damage his reputation. This suggests that the damage to public confidence has already been done. Faith and trust in officials has already collapsed. The openly corrupt acts are just the mask falling off.

Perhaps, then, what openly corrupt acts demand is not merely a response to those offenses. What they may demand is a response to all instances, large or small, where citizens are justified in perceiving that a public official could be placing private interests over those of the public. When a candidate for chair of the DNC declares that his party only takes money from the good billionaires, when $15 billion dollars of private funding were spent on political campaigns in 2024, when a bi-partisan group of senators sold literal millions of dollars of stock prior to the COVID-19 pandemic and numerous bills banning congressional stock trading fail to even reach the floor despite overwhelming public support, restoring public confidence in the integrity of elected officials may require addressing all potential sources of corruption. The most severe and flagrant acts may just be the symptom of a larger underlying disease that must be remedied.

The Pardon of Alice Marie Johnson

photograph of Alice Johnson being granted clemency at State of the Union in 2018

The 2020 Republican Convention featured dozens of predictable guest speakers, many of whom have been President Trump’s closest allies and defenders. However, a speaker that came as a shock to many was criminal justice advocate Alice Marie Johnson. Johnson, who had her sentence commuted by Trump in 2018, spoke about how President Trump had impacted her life through his compassion. Politico, reporting on her speech, referred to Johnson as being “propped up” by the Trump administration. Many on Twitter criticized Politico’s characterization of Johnson as racist and demeaning toward Johnson as a Black woman.

What should we make of Alice Johnson’s show of support for Trump at the RNC?  And how should we interpret President Trump’s pardoning of Johnson immediately following the convention?

In 1996, Alice Johnson was convicted and sentenced to life in prison for attempted possession of drugs and money laundering. Johnson was a first-time non-violent offender, and many considered her sentencing to be not only harsh, but fundamentally unjust. Under all three of the most common theories of punishment: deterrence, retribution, and restorative, Johnson’s sentencing is clearly immoral. A fundamental principle of retributive justice is that punishment be proportional to the crime. While deterrence seeks to use punishment to discourage recidivism, the charges brought against Johnson and the sentencing that followed were so harsh that there was no true due notice by which she could have been deterred and since she was sentenced to life in prison, she had no opportunity for which to be deterred. Lastly, Johnson’s sentencing is clearly unethical under a restorative justice model since it gave Johnson no opportunity for rehabilitation, to restore the harm that had been caused, or to change her impact on society after release.

While criminal justice reform non-profit CAN-DO had been advocating for Johnson since 2014, the case caught national attention when celebrity Kim Kardashian West became involved in the project to grant Johnson clemency in 2018. In a widely reported meeting at the White House, Kardashian West urged Donald Trump to commute Johnson’s sentence. Merely one week after this meeting, Trump announced he would be commuting Johnson’s sentence effective immediately. On June 6 2018, Johnson was released from prison and reunited with her family. Johnson’s case has been cited as an example of the racial inequity of the criminal justice system toward Black people. Since her release, Johnson has become an outspoken advocate for criminal justice relief and touts a host of academic and cultural accolades.

Johnson’s appearance at the RNC is not her first time publicly associating with conservatives. On March 1, 2020 she appeared as a guest speaker at the American Conservative Union. During her talk, she endorsed “Right on Crime” an organization which calls itself “The Conservative Approach to Criminal Justice.” Right on Crime’s mission argues that “For too long…American conservatives have ceded the intellectual ground on criminal justice.” Right on Crime proposes reforms highlighting values such as public safety, right-size government, fiscal discipline, victim support, personal responsibility, government accountability, family preservation, and free enterprise. Despite her endorsement of the conservative approach to criminal justice, Johnson has also expressed support for more liberal approaches to criminal justice reform, such as ending mandatory sentencing, promoting prisoner education, and abolishing cash bail.

Johnson’s decision to deliver a speech at the RNC and vocalize her support for Donald Trump is especially interesting given the increase in activism spurred by the murder of George Floyd earlier this year. Trump himself has refused to support the Black Lives Matter movement and has actively undermined and demonized many demonstrations over the past few months. He has consistently voiced his support for law enforcement officials during the ongoing protests and calls to defund the police in recent months. Back in July, he ordered National Guard troops to tear-gas protestors outside of the White House for a photo-op. Considering the fact that police reform is a large component of many criminal justice reform doctrines, it is strange that Alice Johnson is choosing to vocalize support for a president who has threatened that if reelected he will “restore law and order to our country.” Johnson’s decision to align herself with Trump might strike some as hypocritical and even dangerous — especially if her continued support is interpreted as proof that President Trump is not racist or is morally righteous in his approach to criminal justice. In an article in The Nation, Elie Mystal argued that “The Republican National Convention has been all about using Black people to convince white people it’s OK to vote for a bigot.” Johnson was one of several black speakers at the RNC, many of whom at least partially undermined the characterization of Donald Trump as racist. In addition to Black speakers, the convention featured a naturalization ceremony for five new American citizens, none of whom knew that footage of them would appear during the convention. This ceremony has also been heralded as ironic considering Trump’s vast record on anti-immigration stances and policies.

On the other hand, Johnson’s decision to speak at the RNC could be either out of a perceived personal obligation to the president or in an attempt to ‘reach across the aisle’ and generate more support for criminal justice reform. President Trump quite literally changed Johnson’s life when he commuted her life sentence. Even consistent critics of Trump, heralded his decision as compassionate and progressive. But some have suggested that Johnson might feel a personal obligation toward Trump, influencing her decision to accept an invitation to speak at the RNC. Others might argue that commuting her sentence was not an act of kindness, but rather morally obligatory, considering how the stark injustice of her sentencing, discussed above. Therefore, Johnson does not owe anything to Trump and is under no obligation to support him.

Johnson has also been very vocal about her desire to make criminal justice an apolitical issue. Perhaps her decision to support President Trump is to appeal to Republicans and potentially inspire them to advocate for social justice reform. During her speech, Johnson declared, “there are thousands of people just like me, who deserve the opportunity to just come home.” She also referenced the First Step Act, signed into law by Trump in 2018. Johnson indicated that this was important, but that is only a stepping stone. If Johnson’s speech at the RNC encouraged even a few Republicans to reconsider their views on the criminal justice system, it is arguably ethically justified. Additionally, some criticisms of Johnson’s speech are clearly unethical. Politico’s aforementioned characterization of Johnson as a “prop” disacknowledges her as an individual with political and moral agency. It might also imply that she is only speaking in support of Trump’s administration for selfish or opportunistic reasons. This type of objectification and suspicion of Black women has a very long history and is unfortunately still quite common in American culture and politics.

While Trump’s pardon of Johnson seems morally justified from multiple viewpoints, his timing raises troubling questions about his motive. Why not officially pardon Johnson when he commuted her sentence? Considering the fact that Trump was recently impeached for attempting to partake in “quid pro quo” behavior, it would not be irrational to interpret his pardoning of Johnson as a way of rewarding her for supporting him at the convention. The case for this interpretation becomes stronger when one considers Trump’s history of pardoning his political allies. Though some might argue that there is nothing inherently wrong with quid pro quo politics, the president’s record of such behavior is not of making deals with peers, but rather, bullying those who he holds power over into submission. It’s arguable that this type of strong-arming is more characteristic of a tyrant than of a democratic leader.

Despite speaking in support of Trump during the RNC, Johnson refused to use the word “endorse” when speaking about her support for him as president. The day after she was pardoned, Johnson refused to officially endorse Donald Trump, while admitting that she supports Donald Trump as a president and hopes to work with him more in the future on criminal justice reform. What we should make of Johnson’s support is not an easy question to answer, but Donald Trump’s decision to pardon Johnson immediately after her show of support adds to a troubling pattern of opportunistic exertion of presidential powers.

The Trump/Zelensky Exchange: The “Though” Makes It Quid Pro Quo

photograph of Trump and Zelensky posing for cameras, seated and shaking hands

The Trump administration released a “transcript” of the recent phone call between Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky and Trump. The administration seems to think that the document proves there was no quid pro quo arrangement suggested by the president. They claim that defense funding was never made conditional on Ukraine investigating Joe Biden or his son. Supporters of the president have dismissed the uproar as motivated by partisan politics, and regard any suggestion that the memo might represent an impeachable offence “a huge overreach” by Democrats.

But the accusation of a quid pro quo arrangement between a sitting president and a foreign government is a big deal. Asking the Ukrainian president to investigate a political rival by itself is sketchy. But to dangle defense funding in front of Ukraine and suggest that Ukraine won’t get it unless they come through is clearly an abuse of power. These types of political dealings were precisely the kind the founding fathers thought essential to keep out of our democracy. To use the power of the presidency for personal gain or to undermine a political rival is precisely the kind of power the founding fathers meant to curb with the constraints they placed on the executive branch. As Zack Beauchamp of Vox has argued,

The president is trying to get a foreign power to open an investigation into the highest-polling Democratic candidate, perhaps Trump’s likeliest opponent for reelection in 2020, on an extremely flimsy pretext — to turn Biden’s fake Ukraine scandal into “her emails” 2.0. He is actively working to weaponize the presidency to boost his political fortunes.

Not only would this constitute election interference, it further threatens to give a foreign power leverage over another nation’s commander-in-chief.

The administration has been adamant that no such deal was officially presented. In Trump’s own words he said, “I didn’t do it. There was no quid pro quo.” Many news outlets have tended to confirm this account; without anything more explicit it’s hard to say definitively whether an offer was intended or whether it was interpreted as such. This ambiguity has led the Justice Department to conclude that prosecutors “did not and could not make out a criminal campaign finance violation.” Without a clearer picture of the actual goods on offer and any clear-cut proposal, the DOJ found it difficult to hold the president accountable for soliciting foreign support in his upcoming presidential campaign.

But there is one word in the transcript of the phone call between Donald Trump and Zelensky that makes it pretty clear that Donald Trump threatened to withhold defense funding from Ukraine if Ukraine did not investigate Joe Biden and his son. It’s the word “though”.

Here is the excerpt that matters:

President Zelenskyy

I would also like to thank you for your great support in the area of defense. We are ready to continue to cooperate for the next steps. Specifically we are almost ready to buy more Javelins from the United States for defense purposes.

The President

I would like you to do us a favor though because our country has been through a lot and Ukraine knows a lot about it. I would like you to find out what happened with this whole situation with Ukraine, they say Crowdstrike… I guess you have one of your wealthy people… The server, they say Ukraine has it. There are a lot of things that went on, the whole situation. I think you’re surrounding yourself with some of the same people..

President Zelinskyy thanked President Trump for defense support and mentioned that he would like to continue this cooperation. The first sentence out of Trump’s mouth is “I would like you to do us a favor though.” He goes on to ask for an investigation of Biden as part of this favor. In this context, “though” would literally be defined as “placing a restriction or condition on what was previously said.”

Had Trump left that word out, this still looks pretty close to quid pro quo, but there is still the possibility of inferring some weaker claim. On the other hand, one might infer that though he didn’t explicitly threaten to withhold funding unless an investigation happened, it’s implied by asking for the favor. The “though” is what actually makes this an explicit threat; it’s what removes this ambiguity.

It’s up to Congress and the American People to decide what should be done next. As a matter of political expediency, we can argue about whether impeachment is a good idea or not. But whatever is decided, let’s not pretend that this phone call was anything other than an explicit threat by a sitting US President to stop cooperating with Ukraine on their military defense unless they investigated his political rival. The “though” makes this clearly a quid pro quo exchange.