Sen. Elizabeth Warren is keeping up a grueling presidential campaign schedule, but she has not lost a step in her day job in the Senate, as Donald Trump’s nominee for secretary of Defense found out Tuesday. Mark Esper was a top lobbyist for defense contractor Raytheon, but he’s not interested in resolving that conflict of interest by permanently recusing himself from decisions involving his former employer.
Warren zeroed in on that and on Esper’s ability to get a waiver from recusing himself while he’s still waiting for a final seven-figure payout from Raytheon, questioning Esper about why he’s not doing what former acting Secretary Pat Shanahan did when Shanahan permanently recused himself from decisions about Boeing, his former employer. (See a pattern in who Trump is elevating?) Warren pressed hard for yes or no answers as Esper fought to filibuster and evade. He really did not want to commit to stepping back from decisions affecting his former employer—having some loopholes is very important to Esper.
Senate Armed Services Committee Chair Jim Inhofe first stepped in to defend Esper from the questioning, then cut Warren off after Esper got up on a very wobbly high horse to make the case for why he should absolutely be allowed to mix million-dollar payouts from defense contractors with so-called public service. (Spoiler: Esper’s high horse involved his own past military service.) “This is outrageous,” Warren said as Inhofe dinged her on time after repeatedly creating space for Esper to filibuster.
But before that, Warren summed up the situation: “Let me get this straight. You’re still due to get at least a million-dollar payout from when you lobbied for Raytheon. You won’t commit to recuse yourself. You insist on being free to seek a waiver that would let you make decisions affecting Raytheon’s bottom line and your remaining financial interest. And you won’t rule out taking a trip right back through the revolving door on your way out of government service or even just delaying that trip for four years after you leave government.”