Not all politicians come into office wealthy – but many leave that way.
That’s one reason we hear a lot about the “swamp” in Washington, D.C.
Our familiarity with the term largely began when self-described billionaire Donald Trump convinced enough voters that he would be the voice of hard-working Americans who haven’t had raises in a decade and whose children have a hard time finding and keeping good jobs.
It turns out, of course, that President Trump hasn’t been the voice of hard-working Americans. But that was just the first pledge he broke. The second was his promise to “drain” the swamp.
But he didn’t divest himself of his own businesses. Instead, he and his family continue to profit, even on a federally owned vintage post office building in Washington which his company leases and operates as a hotel despite an obvious conflict of interest. As president, he is his own landlord and oversees anyone who might inspect his post office/hotel profits. Meanwhile, foreign and domestic visitors who do business with the White House often stay at this hotel and eat there, hoping to curry Trump’s favor.