Public Citizen Agrees With Federal Watchdog, Conway Must Go
Statements of Public Citizen Experts
Note: The Office of Special Counsel (OSC) today recommended the dismissal of White House employee Kellyanne Conway for violating the Hatch Act. In 2017, the U.S. Office of Government Ethics (OGE) concluded that Conway misused her position by using a television interview to urge the public to buy Ivanka Trump products. Public Citizen filed a complaint on Feb. 9, 2017, asking the OGE to investigate.
“The OSC has stepped up and made crystal clear the inappropriate nature of a White House employee defying the law in plain sight. Conway must be removed and face consequences for her actions.”
– Lisa Gilbert, vice president of legislative affairs, Public Citizen
“‘Blah, blah, blah,’ Conway said in May when she dismissed the findings of the OSC that she broke the law with two interviews she gave in late 2017.
“Today OSC took Conway’s taunts to heart and wrote a letter to President Trump noting that since Conway is a repeat offender of the Hatch Act and shows no respect for the law, she should be removed from federal service.
“Public Citizen heartily agrees. Conway is making a mockery of our laws and is taunting those who are charged with enforcing standards of conduct for federal employees, and so should face appropriate legal consequences. It need not be jail, as Conway has belittlingly said, but get her out of the White House.”
– Craig Holman, government affairs lobbyist, Public Citizen’s Congress Watch division