After a lengthy delay, President-elect Donald Trump’s transition team has signed a memorandum of understanding with the White House, allowing the next administration to coordinate with federal agencies.
Trump’s incoming White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles said in a statement the memo’s signing allows for “critical preparations” to begin.
“After completing the selection process of his incoming Cabinet, President-elect Trump is entering the next phase of his administration’s transition by executing a Memorandum of Understanding with President Joe Biden’s White House,” Wiles said in a statement.
The agreement allows an incoming administration to begin presidential transitions, allowing it to access resources provided by the federal government, such as personnel and documents belonging to federal agencies.
During the campaign, Trump’s team had blown past an Oct. 1 deadline to enter a memorandum of understanding with the White House. He also missed a Sept. 1 deadline to enter a similar agreement with the General Services Administration.
Trump’s missing the deadlines prompted sharp criticism from former officials, ethics experts, and lawmakers.
The top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee, Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland, rang alarm bells over Trump abstaining from entering the agreements in October. NBC News previously reported that Raskin sent a letter to Trump and his running mate, Sen. JD Vance of Ohio, warning that failure to enter an agreement could imperil a smooth and peaceful transition of power.
Raskin wrote that Trump’s team was “breaking the precedent set by every other presidential candidate since 2010″ by not accepting the resources provided by the federal government.
Trump’s team said it did not sign an agreement with the General Services Administration, which would have given them additional resources to assist with the transition, including funding and office space, instead operating as a “self-sufficient organization.”
White House spokesperson Saloni Sharma said that the White House and the GSA repeatedly made the case to Trump’s team to sign both memoranda since September, following tradition. Sharma said the White House disagrees with Trump’s failure to sign the GSA memo, but will facilitate a smooth transition as the “responsible course and in the best interest of the American people.”
“While we do not agree with the Trump transition team’s decision to forgo signing the GSA MOU, we will follow the purpose of the Presidential Transition Act which clearly states that ‘any disruption occasioned by the transfer of the executive power could produce results detrimental to the safety and wellbeing of the United States and its people,’” Sharma said.
The agreement with the White House outlined that Trump must publicly post his ethics plan for the transition team on the GSA website.
That document was uploaded Tuesday evening and followed the standard pattern for such agreements, including promising to avoid conflicts of interest and pledging to protect classified and non-public information.
White House officials also said that Trump’s team had also not signed an agreement with the Justice Department, which would allow the FBI to conduct background checks on Cabinet nominees — a topic that has become a flashpoint among lawmakers since Trump started making his picks to lead federal agencies.
The Trump transition team and the Justice Department did not immediately respond to requests for comment Tuesday evening.
