Transparency Advocates Call on Trump to Release WH Visitor Logs

Transparency advocates are pressing President-elect Donald Trump to release White House visitor logs during his second presidential term, reports the Washington Examiner.

The White House during Trump's first term from 2017-2021 wouldn't release records of its visitors, a break from the policy of former President Barack Obama's administration — President Joe Biden has also made the logs public.

"Visitors logs should be made public," CEO Peter Flaherty of the National Legal and Policy Center, an ethics watchdog group, told the Washington Examiner.

"The White House sits atop a vast executive bureaucracy," said Flaherty.

"The White House should set an example for transparency, even though it's not required by law."

Nick Penniman, the founder and CEO of Issue One, a group that investigates federal influence, told the news outlet that Americans "pay the salaries of those who work for our government, so we deserve to know who they're meeting with."

"So, as President Trump prepares to return to Washington, employees of the West Wing should be transparent with taxpayers about who's potentially influencing policy decisions at the highest level."

Craig Holman, a progressive ethics expert at the Public Citizen think tank, said White House visitor log disclosures are critical to understanding "influence peddling in the executive branch."

"White House visitor log disclosures let the press and public know who is talking to the administration staff and when — whether or not they are registered lobbyists," Holman added.

"The visitor logs let us know the CEOs of which companies or other special interests are being entertained by White House staff or even the president. It allows the press and the public to connect the dots between White House policies and special interests that the Lobbying Disclosure Act alone cannot provide."

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