US President Donald Trump’s daughter, Ivanka, and her husband, Jared Kushner, have been sued for intentionally leaving out critical information from their public financial disclosure forms.
The lawsuit, brought by Washington, DC-based lawyer Jeffrey Lovitky, accuses the couple, who are both serving as senior White House advisers, of failing to reveal assets from 30 investment funds.
"The failure of Defendants to provide the information as herein described deprived Plaintiff of (a) an opportunity to make an independent judgment as to whether Defendants are or reasonably could be influenced by conflicts of interests, (b) information required to evaluate and judge the performance of Defendants in their official duties, (c) information required to determine whether trust in the integrity of Defendants is warranted, and (d) information required to participate in the political process in an informed manner," the complaint reads.
Kushner has made several amendments to his financial disclosure since becoming an adviser to Trump, revealing dozens of previously undisclosed assets. He insists that the assets had been “inadvertently omitted.”
In order to take his new position in the Trump administration, Kushner had to resign from 266 posts related to his investments. He has divested only a small portion of his holdings.
Trump and his son-in-law have both been fined for failing to submit their financial disclosure forms on time.
Lovitky, a health care finance lawyer who sometimes files civil rights cases, had previously sued Trump over his financial disclosure forms, accusing him of not clarifying how responsible he was for debts he listed on a form he filed during the 2016 campaign.
That suit — which has gone on to include claims related to a new form Trump filed in June — is pending investigation. The Justice Department has indicated that it would dismiss the case, but the judge has yet to make a ruling.