A top U.S. Justice Department official who serves as a corporate compliance watchdog has resigned, saying she felt she could no longer force companies to comply with the government’s ethics laws when members of the administration she works for have conducted themselves in a manner so “unethical” that should not be tolerated.
Hui Chen had served in the department’s compliance counsel office until she resigned on moral grounds breaking her silence in a LinkedIn post last week titled “Mission Matters,” which points to the Trump administration’s behavior as the reason for her job change.
In her post, the former Federal Prosecutor wrote:
“To sit across the table from companies and question how committed they were to ethics and compliance felt not only hypocritical but very much like shuffling the deck chair on the Titanic.”
Chen pointed to the multiple lawsuits filed against President Trump questioning the legality of his ties to his family business empire.
She added:
“Even as I engaged in those questioning and evaluations, on my mind were the numerous lawsuits pending against the President of the United States for everything from violations of the Constitution to conflict of interest, the ongoing investigations of potentially treasonous conducts, and the investigators and prosecutors fired for their pursuits of principles and facts.”
“Those are conducts I would not tolerate seeing in a company, yet I worked under an administration that engaged in exactly those conduct. I wanted no more part in it.”
Chen said that management in her office “persistently prohibited me from public speaking.”
Chen was responsible for guiding the department’s fraud section of the Criminal Division through certain issues like “the prosecution of business entities,” according to a Justice Department press release at the time.
She also had to ensure that companies properly carried out their end of negotiated agreements that they reached with prosecutors and that they did not continue to break the law.
Chen, whose contract expires in October, decided to leave months before then.
Before her resignation, Chen had posted tweets or retweeted articles that were considered critical of President Trump.
”For those who truly care about #ethics, ignoring our current #conductatthetop requires abandonment of conscience,” she tweeted last month.
A Justice Department spokesman said in a statement that the Fraud office is “deeply appreciative of Ms. Chen’s efforts,” Corporate Counsel reported last week.
However, Chen said Top DOJ officials tried to silence her from publicly speaking out against the White House.
