Skeptics have included Jay Clayton, the chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, whom Mr. Trump nominated to the position in early 2017. Mr. Clayton was an author of a 2011 paper that argued that the United States’ anti-bribery policies tended “to place disproportionate burdens on U.S. regulated companies in international transactions,” hurting American competitiveness.
Despite such criticisms and Mr. Trump’s misgivings, top administration officials have pledged to uphold the law.
“We will continue to strongly enforce” anti-corruption laws, Jeff Sessions, the attorney general at the time, said in a speech in April 2017. “Companies should succeed because they provide superior products and services, not because they have paid off the right people.”
And under the current attorney general, William P. Barr, who was confirmed last year, enforcement actions have continued to rapidly roll in.
“The past three years have shown that very little has changed,” said Joshua D. Roth, a lawyer specializing in these issues at Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver Jacobson, despite early expectations that enforcement might fall off under the Trump administration. “What some of us were forecasting really didn’t materialize.”
The administration has made other moves that dovetail with the president’s disdain for anti-bribery laws.
Early in his administration, Mr. Trump signed a measure from Congress striking down a rule from the Securities and Exchange Commission that would have required oil, gas and mining companies listed on United States stock exchanges to disclose how much they were paying to foreign governments.
Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/15/business/economy/trump-bribery-law.html?emc=rss&partner=rss
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