Former federal prosecutor Andrew Weissmann on Tuesday warned that under President Donald Trump “it’s a great time to be a corporate criminal” in America ― and also to be a foreign adversary.
Weissmann talked with MSNBC’s Katy Tur about a series of recent Trump administration moves, like the pardon of former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich (D), the decision not to enforce the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and weakened enforcement of the Foreign Agents Registration Act.
“Take all these things together and then tell me what the Justice Department is going to be interested in doing,” Tur asked.
“I think that is exactly the right way to look at this,” Weissmann responded. “You have to look at this together and not individually. As a friend of mine said, who is a white-collar defense lawyer, ‘This is a great time to be a corporate criminal.’”
Weissmann noted that “every single country in the world prohibits bribery” but now “the law of the jungle” rules in the U.S. “where every corporation is now free to […] bribe companies and bribe public officials in order to gain business.”
“Who does that?” he asked. “This is supposed to be a rule-of-law country.”
These wholesale policy changes, Weissmann said, are “horrendous if you believe in the rule of law” and will ultimately make America unsafe.
Bad actors now have free rein to engage in white-collar crime, while political adversaries can openly exploit the U.S. system, he cautioned.
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And Attorney General Pam Bondi is likely “going to look the other way,” Weissmann added.
Watch the analysis here: