Thread by @EricLiptonNYT

THREAD: Lets take a closer look at the ways that Elaine Chao & staff violated federal ethics rules while she DOT Secretary--using fed taxpayer resources to benefit her family. DOT staff (OST) here worked on planned trip to China slated to include her dad James Chao, AKA Dr Chao

So all this work by DOT staff in Office Sec of Transportation (OST) caused the alarms to go off at DOT Gen Counsel's office. You can't use fed staff to do this kind of stuff.

How would you respond to ethics alarm bells like this? Keep going? Well that is what Chao's office did. And her sister Angela Chao, also an executive at Foremost Group, which is building ships in China with Chinese gov financial support, was on planned trip....

Let's look a bit more closely at this one...So DOT staff is busy working to set up "top leaders" meeting planned for her China trip. US Ambassador to China "I'm sure" will be there. Chao's sister, a top executive at Foremost. Yes. But staff from DOT? "None" So what was this for?

This trip was cancelled--but only after airline tickets were bought. And when State Department officials also raised alarms. How do we know this. The NYT sued the State Department to get these emails.

But the planned trip to China was only the start of the ethics issues, IG report shows. Chao's staff were tasked to help edit a book her dad was writing and then orchestrate a major media and PR campaign to promote it--using the clout of her office to deliver on this agenda.

DOT staff also helped edit James Chao's Wikipedia page, and to set up a series of events that featured Chinese-language media, to help promote his book, and his story as the "Chinese ship king" as "Foremost Group 'ascended to its status in the world."

What else? DOT staff called AMTRAK for Chao's family shipping company--the Sec of Transportation calling Amtrak?--to charter a full rail car for the company execs to make trip to DC. Why? In part again to bring Chinese-language media attention to FOREMOST and her dad.

The IG report goes on 38 PAGES with examples like this. It gets repetitive. It is hard to read them all. There are just so many examples. DOT staff assigned to help promote her dad and sister--executives at major freight shipping company doing business in China.

Now it is true. The report does not make a formal finding a ethics violations. But that is pretty standard. Inspector General identifies what the ethics rules are and what happened, then it refers its findings to the DOT General Counsel's office and to DOJ Criminal Prosecutors.

But what this report DOES NOT DO is clear Elaine Chao of any allegations of wrongdoing. It identifies what she did/what the rules are. And referred it to others to take actions. DOJ passed on this matter in Mid December. The DOT IG, after Chao resigned, then closed the case.

Yes, this is a long thread. But thought you should know the details, so they are not lost to history. And by the way, this whole IG investigation took place after @PekingMike @KeithBradsher @suilee did this story in 2019, discussing many of these issues. nytimes.com/2019/06/02/us/…

Here was the letter requesting the investigation. Click on link for full letter. Reporting by Politico also cited. int.nyt.com/data/documentt…

We have written news stories about the results of the IG report. See this. But sometimes a tweet thread like this helps you get an even clearer picture. This story posted on Thursday evening. with @PekingMike and @ktbenner and @maggieNYT nytimes.com/2021/03/04/us/…

A final note: Thank you NYT readers for supporting our work. Our investigation into this involved reporters in NY, DC & China, as well as NYT lawyers who sued the State Department to get documents to first open this matter up. More than a year of effort. Worthwhile, I think

One clarification. The IG report did examine other issues related to Chao, such as allegations that she had steered funds to Kentucky to potentially benefit her husband, then Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. The IG found no evidence to support this allegation.

And here is the entire IG report. You can read it yourself. int.nyt.com/data/documentt…