Concerns over Trump still allowing his company to profit from foreign officials

Donald Trump will continue to risk violating the US constitution by allowing his company to profit from foreign government officials, according to documents released by Congress on Wednesday.

Executives at the president’s hotel business said they were not prepared to make efforts to check whether customers worked for overseas states, in part, because this would be awkward for the Trump brand.

It conceded that Trump’s company may inadvertently collect profits from other governments. The emoluments clause of the constitution forbids US officials from being paid by a “foreign state”.

Norman Eisen, a former ethics counsel to Barack Obama, said in an email that Trump appeared unwilling to comply even with the “woefully deficient” plan to prevent corruption that he set out earlier this year.

“If there were any doubt about the president’s contempt for the constitution, this new information lays it to rest,” said Eisen, who is involved in a lawsuit alleging that Trump is in violation of the emoluments clause.

The Trump Organization’s statement appeared in a document it provided to the House oversight committee in response to a request for more details of Trump’s stated plan to give any profits from foreign governments to the US Treasury.

“To fully and completely identify all patronage at our properties by customer type is impractical in the service industry and putting forth a policy that requires all guests to identify themselves would impede upon personal privacy and diminish the guest experience of our brand,” the document stated.

The company went on to suggest that it would only set aside profits made from customers who explicitly identify themselves as being a “representative of a foreign government entity on foreign government business”.

In contrast to traditional text-heavy submissions to congressional committees, the Trump Organization sent an eight-page glossy pamphlet featuring 17 photographs of Trump’s luxury properties and golf courses.

Congressman Elijah Cummings of Maryland, the committee’s most senior Democrat, said the company’s “meager response” was inadequate. He urged Trump to sell his corporate holdings or have Congress examine and approve his finances.

“Complying with the United States constitution is not an optional exercise, but a requirement for serving as our nation’s president,” Cummings said in a statement.

Trump’s pledge to forfeit profits made from foreign governments was part of a package of measures he unveiled shortly before his inauguration in January. The measures were widely condemned as insufficient to prevent Trump facing potential conflicts between the interests of the US and his personal finances.