The lease on the ornate hotel that Donald Trump recently completed near the White House appears to bar participation by any elected official, posing an acute conflict-of-interest challenge just seven weeks before Inauguration Day.
The 60-year lease for the former post office pavilion, released under the Freedom of Information Act, was examined by two George Washington University procurement experts who published their findings this week in "Government Executive," a trade publication. They argued that the government should extricate itself from the deal.