Pelosi rips Trump for 'degrading' plan to give nomination acceptance speech from the White House
Speaker Nancy Pelosi has sharply criticised Donald Trump for suggesting he will "probably" accept the Republican presidential nomination in a speech at the White House, an unprecedented move that could open Trump administration aides up to an array of federal ethics crimes.
"You don't have political events at the White House," Ms Pelosi, the longtime California Democrat, said in an interview with MSNBC on Wednesday. "You can't do it."
The federal Hatch Act typically prevents a political candidate from using government employees and property for campaign purposes, although the president and vice president are exempt.
But Mr Trump's government aides cannot engage in campaign-related activity.
"For the president of the United States to degrade once again the White House as he has done over and over again by saying he's going to completely politicize it, is something that should be rejected right out of hand," Ms Pelosi said.
The speaker suggested Mr Trump was publicly floating such a controversial event to distract from his administration's response to the coronavirus pandemic, which Democrats have criticised as wholly insufficient and reckless.
"It's notion-mongering, not serious thinking," Ms Pelosi said.
Several legal and political ethics experts aired their frustrations about Republicans' plans to use White House grounds for the acceptance speech, saying it puts Mr Trump's advisers in legal jeopardy.
"Here we go .... again. A staged political event at the White House. Every White House staff member who participates in this violates the Hatch Act," tweeted Richard W Painter, the former chief White House ethics lawyer under President George W Bush.
Mr Trump was initially slated to deliver his keynote speech in Charlotte, North Carolina, the original site of this year's convention, but the president nixed those plans after publicly sparring with Democratic Governor Roy Cooper, who said they only way Republicans could hold the convention in his state was if they did so in compliance with social distancing guidelines.
Speaking events for the convention were subsequently moved to Jacksonville, Florida. But Mr Trump scrapped those plans in July after Covid-19 cases resurged in the Sunshine State.
Mr Trump has emphasised the security and low cost of delivering his nomination acceptance speech at the White House compared to an outside venue, for which Secret Service agents would have to set up travel and safety plans for the president and several of his support staff.
White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows told reporters on Wednesday that while it would be "appropriate" for the president to accept the nomination from the residential East Wing of the White House, he doubts Mr Trump will actually deliver his speech there.
Mr Trump — whose romp across US stages in 2016 at his signature raucous rallies put his penchant for controversy and showmanship on full display — has been largely confined to the White House this election cycle.
His most-publicised campaign rally, a 20 June event in Tulsa, Oklahoma, was widely panned as a flop and has been linked to a local surge of coronavirus cases in the city.
Some 6,200 people attended Mr Trump’s event at the 19,000-seat BOK Center arena in June — with Covid-19 concerns an apparent deterrent for some.
The rally is also where Tea Party favourite Herman Cain, a staunch Trump supporter, is believed to have contracted Covid-19, which ultimately killed him.
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