In conjunction with the Campaign Legal Center (CLC), this COGEL Connect program is free and open to CLC and COGEL members.

Within days of his inauguration, the president removed officials at the Office of Government Ethics, Office of Special Counsel, offices of multiple independent inspectors general, and agency ethics officials.  These watchdog agencies and positions were created as a part of ethics reforms at the federal level in the wake of Watergate, and were considered fundamental, vital checks on potential government corruption. Months later, the consequences are becoming clear, and questions remain. Why did ethics watchdogs become targets? Who’s left to guard our federal institutions? What impacts, if any, will these actions make on COGEL’s member agencies, many of whom also were borne from Watergate ethics reforms?

COGEL has partnered with Campaign Legal Center for this critical discussion, which will include former officials with first-hand knowledge of the consequences of this dramatic shift in government ethics.

RECORDING: This session will be recorded. Please register to have the recording sent to you after the program.

Trevor Potter President Campaign Legal Center

Current president of the Campaign Legal Center and Republican former Chairman of the Federal Election Commission (FEC), Trevor was general counsel to John McCain’s 2000 and 2008 presidential campaigns and an adviser to the drafters of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law. To many, he is perhaps best known for his recurring appearances on The Colbert Report as the lawyer for Stephen Colbert’s super PAC, Americans for a Better Tomorrow, Tomorrow, during the 2012 election, a program that won a Peabody Award for excellence in reporting on money in politics.

The American Bar Association Journal has described Trevor as “hands-down one of the top lawyers in the country on the delicate intersection of politics, law and money.” Trevor is the author of several books and manuals on lobbying regulation and disclosure, campaign finance and federal election law. He has provided testimony and written statements to Congress on federal election proposals, campaign finance regulation and, recently, the effects of the January 6th attack on our democracy. He has also taught campaign finance law at the University of Virginia School of Law and Oxford University, and he has appeared widely in national broadcast and print media. During the 2020 election season, Trevor was named to the cross-partisan National Task Force on Election Crises.

David Huitema is an accomplished ethics and compliance leader, most recently serving as the presidentially-appointed and Senate-confirmed director of the United States Office of Government Ethics. Previously, Mr. Huitema was the Assistant Legal Adviser for Ethics and Financial Disclosure at the United States Department of State for nine years. Mr. Huitema held several other positions during his 18-year tenure at the Department of State.

Bob Stern Commissioner Los Angeles City Ethics Commission

Bob Stern is a nationally recognized expert in the fields of campaign finance and government reform and is a current commissioner on the Los Angeles City Ethics Commission. He was a principal co-author of California's Political Reform Act, and a principal drafter of the City of Los Angeles Ethics and Public Campaign Financing law, approved by the city’s voters in 1990. He was the first general counsel of the California Fair Political Practices Commission, and a past President of COGEL. He was honored with the COGEL Award in 1988.

Rob Storch Adjunct Professor Georgetown Law School

The Honorable Robert P. Storch served most recently as the Presidentially-appointed Senate confirmed (PAS) Inspector General for the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD), from 2022 to January 2025. In that position, he led a team of more than 1,850 auditors, evaluators, lawyers, criminal and administrative investigators, and support professionals in more than 50 offices worldwide in conducting robust programmatic and investigative oversight of DoD programs and personnel. He also served as the Congressionally-designated Special Inspector General overseeing U.S. assistance to Ukraine, and as Lead Inspector General for overseas contingency operations related to countering ISIS in Iraq and Syria and furthering U.S. policy goals in Afghanistan. Rob previously served as the first PAS Inspector General at the National Security Agency (NSA), the Deputy Inspector General and Whistleblower Ombudsperson for the U.S. Department of Justice, and for some two dozen years as a federal prosecutor at two U.S. Attorney’s Offices and, between them, the Public Integrity Section of the Criminal Division at DOJ.

Rob is now an Adjunct Professor at Georgetown Law School in the fall of 2025, and will be a Lecturer in Law at Columbia Law School in the spring of 2026.  He obtained his B.A., magna cum laude, from Harvard University, and graduated as a Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar from Columbia Law School.

Ellen Weintraub Senior Fellow End Citizens United

Ellen L. Weintraub served as Commissioner and four-time Chair of the U.S. Federal Election Commission from 2002 to 2025. She has been an outspoken advocate for meaningful campaign-finance law enforcement, robust disclosure, combating foreign influence in our elections, and protecting the institutions of our democracy. On February 6, 2025, contrary to law and precedent, she was fired by the President without cause and without replacement, resulting in the FEC losing its functional quorum in May 2025.

A graduate of Yale College and Harvard Law School, Ellen has published articles in The New York Times, The Washington Post, and leading law reviews and is a frequent speaker on news shows and at conferences at home and abroad. Previously, she practiced law with the Political Law Group at Perkins Coie LLP and was Counsel to the U.S. House Ethics Committee. She is currently a Senior Fellow at End Citizens United.