USTR Staffers Quest for Clients Draws Complaint From Group (1)

Two former officials who helped negotiate an overhaul of North American trade rules may have violated federal ethics standards when they sought private-sector consulting work while still on the government payroll, according to a complaint filed Thursday by a watchdog group.

Jason Bernstein and Fred Fischer, who served in U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer’s office, might have been in violation of several ethics rules by allegedly soliciting clients for a consulting firm they intended to start after leaving the government, the Campaign Legal Center, a nonpartisan group that favors limiting the influence of money in politics, said in its ...