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AG SEC'Y NOMINEE PERDUE TO SEVER TIES WITH HIS FARMING BUSINESS INTERESTS
Mar. 14, 2017
Bloomberg reports:
President Donald Trump's pick to lead the U.S. Department of Agriculture will sever ties with his farming business while keeping his real estate investments, according to disclosures released Sunday by the Office of Government Ethics.
Sonny Perdue sparked controversy during his two terms as Georgia governor by refusing, as Trump has, to place his assets in a blind trust. But if confirmed as agriculture secretary, he will turn over his company interests to a pair of new trusts in which neither he nor his wife will have a beneficial interest, according the ethics agreement he signed.
Perdue, 70, will still own real estate in Georgia and Florida worth between $1.1 million and $2.3 million, and he will continue to receive payments totaling as much as $6 million that he is owed from his holdings, according to the ethics agreement and his financial disclosure.
That raises a concern about whether Perdue will recuse himself from
situations in which there could be a conflict of interest, said John Wonderlich, executive director of the Sunlight Foundation, a government transparency advocate.
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