By Bridget Brink | Published in the Lansing City Pulse

Pay-to-play politics, firing independent commissioners and inspectors, promising “rich-as-hell” donors massive tax giveaways, allowing foreign countries to invest billions into a leader’s family ventures, and gutting the office that prosecutes misconduct by public officials – these are all tactics I would have expected to come out of the new, struggling democracies I worked in during my 28-year career in the U.S. Foreign Service.

But the reality is that this is just the tip of the iceberg of the corruption that is happening right now in the Trump administration.

In the young democracies that emerged after the fall of the Iron Curtain of communism, I saw firsthand what happens when widespread corruption exists: businesses survive with bribes to government officials, government services decline or stop altogether and people lose trust in democracy. Leaders stopped serving the people and instead started serving themselves. Over the last year, we’ve all seen it happening right here at the highest levels of the American government. In the country I dedicated my life to serving.

Simply put: the chaos and corruption coming out of Washington is costing Michigan families.

I have been an anti-corruption champion my entire career. In Ukraine, I was even criticized for focusing too intensely on corruption. But when I was responsible for safeguarding over $100 billion in U.S. taxpayer assistance from waste, fraud, and abuse – I believe there is simply no such thing.

Elected officials should serve the hardworking families they represent, not their own interests. We need leaders standing up for what’s right, speaking truth to power, and delivering real results — even if it means risking one’s career, like I did when I resigned as U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine in protest of the Trump administration.

We need to tackle the corruption coming out of Washington head-on. My “Restore and Reform Agenda” is a blueprint to clean up Washington and protect our democracy: concrete steps that we, the American people, can take to hold our leaders accountable.

No President, no Supreme Court justice and no member of Congress should be able to use public office for personal profit. That means banning individual stock trading by officials across all three branches of government.

Ending the revolving door with a lifetime ban on members of Congress becoming lobbyists. And going even further by banning immediate family members from serving as lobbyists for the duration of their time in Congress.

A $20 cap on personal gifts for any federal official — no exceptions. This is the limit I abided by during my time in government and it should include every official. The gifting of a $400 million plane to Donald Trump by a foreign government is flat-out wrong.

Legislation that clarifies and limits the presidential pardon power so it can’t be abused. And a binding code of ethics, with full financial and tax disclosures, for leaders in every branch of government.

It also means overturning the Citizens United decision, which flooded politics with secret, unaccountable dark money. And it means blocking congressional pay during government shutdowns, because members of Congress should not be paid when the government is not working.

We are at a critical moment for our country. We need a principled reform agenda and leaders willing to fight like hell to reform Washington.

That’s why now more than ever we need leaders willing to hold the powerful accountable, put power back in the hands of the people, and restore trust in government. I’ve done that throughout my 28 years of service to our country and I’ll do it again in Congress.