Anti-Corruption and Integrity Outlook 2024 – Country Notes: United States

Contextual factors

 

State structure	Executive power	Legislative system	Legal system
Federal	Presidential	Bicameral	Common law

Strategy and institutions on anti-corruption and public integrity

The United States Strategy on Countering Corruption was published in December 2021 and contains five strategic pillars: (i) modernising, coordinating, and resourcing U.S. Government efforts to better fight corruption, (ii) curbing illicit finance, (iii) holding corrupt actors accountable, (iv) preserving and strengthening the multilateral anti-corruption architecture, (v) improving diplomatic engagement and leveraging foreign assistance resources to advance policy goals.

The National Security Council is co-ordinating inter-agency implementation of the U.S. Strategy on Countering Corruption, while the Department of State is responsible for implementation of a range of anti-corruption efforts abroad and the U.S. Agency for International Development is responsible for the implementation of the parts of the strategy related to development programming. The Office of Government Ethics oversees the executive branch ethics program which is responsible for preventing and resolving financial conflicts of interest, and the Office of Management and Budget is responsible for internal control policy in consultation with the Government Accountability Office, which is the supreme audit institution. The Department of Justice is responsible for criminal matters related to the financing of political parties and election campaigns as well as the enforcement component of anti-corruption, while the Federal Election Commission is in charge of overseeing the financing of political parties and election campaigns at the federal level. The Department of Justice also supervises the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA), while the House Committee on Ethics and the Senate Select Committee on Ethics supervise compliance with the Lobbying Disclosure Act (LDA) and conflict-of-interest requirements for members of Congress. Finally, a supervisory body responsible for public information issues is established, and both the Department of Justice’s Office of Information Policy and the National Archives and Records Administration’s Office of Government Information Services are responsible for ensuring compliance with the Access to Information law.

Overview

 

Greatest strengths	Areas to improve
Conflict of interest	Anti-corruption strategy
Lobbying	Political finance - regulations
Political finance - implementation	Transparency of public information - implementation

Anti-corruption strategy

The United States fulfils 53% of criteria on the quality of the strategic framework and 43% on implementation of the strategy in practice, compared to the OECD average of 45% and 36%, respectively.

The strategy has broad coverage with strategic objectives related to public financial management, public procurement, fraud, private sector corruption, health, education, infrastructure, and development. In 2023 the U.S. Department of State adopted an implementation plan with specific actions to implement the strategy, but there are still no monitoring reports containing information on what has been implemented so far. Future strategies could be improved by undertaking public consultation and including information on how their implementation will be financed.

Corruption risk management and audit

Data for the United States were not provided.

Lobbying

As measured against OECD standards on lobbying, the United States is a top performer and fulfils 100% of the criteria for regulations and 67% for practice, compared to the OECD average of 38% and 35% respectively.

The regulatory framework defines lobbying activities and which actors are considered lobbyists and establishes cooling-off periods for both public officials and lobbyists. While there are two separate lobbying registers for the House of Representatives and the Senate, both registers are accessible to the public, the lobbyists can register online, and the information disclosed by lobbyists in the registers includes their name, organisation, domain of intervention, type of lobbying activities, budget for these activities, and pieces of legislation and regulation targeted. The US Attorney's Office for the District of Columbia frequently conducts investigations into non-compliance with the Lobbying Disclosure Act.

Conflict of interest

As measured against OECD standards on conflict of interest, the United States is a top performer and fulfils 100% of criteria on regulations and 89% on practice, compared to the OECD average of 76% and 40% respectively.

The regulatory framework lists incompatibilities between public functions and other public or private activities, defines circumstances and relationships that can lead to conflict-of-interest situations for public officials, and establishes the obligation to manage them. The regulations also establish public financial disclosure requirements, including persons required to file, the contents of the declarations, the procedure for filing, sanctions for failure to file or filing false declarations, and review of declarations. Furthermore, according to the regulations, any member of the cabinet, Congress, and the Supreme Court, as well as any public employee in a high-risk position must submit an interest declaration. Regarding implementation, all members of the cabinet and all members of Congress have submitted interest declarations for the past six years, and all members of the Supreme Court have submitted interest declarations for the past four years. The Office of Government Ethics verifies declarations submitted by executive branch employees using a risk-based approach.

Political finance

As measured against OECD standards on political finance, the United States fulfils 60% of criteria for regulations, compared to the OECD average of 73%.

There is room for improvement regarding the regulatory safeguards on political finance, as there is no complete ban on anonymous donations and no maximum threshold for personal contributions to candidates’ personal campaigns. In terms of implementation of political finance safeguards in practice, the US is among the top performers, fulfilling 86% of criteria on practice, compared to the OECD average of 58%. The Federal Election Commission oversees the financing of political parties and election campaigns, employs certified auditors to delegate this responsibility, and publishes information on the number of cases related to breaches of campaign finance regulations, the total penalty amount, and the average civil penalty. In terms of compliance, all political parties represented in Congress have submitted annual accounts for the past five years and accounts related to elections for the last two election cycles within the timelines defined by national legislation. All financial reports are available online in a user-friendly format.

Transparency of public information

As measured against OECD standards on public information, which includes access to information and open data, the United States fulfils 67% of criteria for regulations and fulfils 54% of criteria for practice compared to OECD average of 67% and 62% respectively.

Access to information legislation in the United States is generally comprehensive, although it does not stipulate that information must be provided completely free of charge. While performing at the level of OECD average in the areas of access to information and open data, many key datasets are not published, such as agendas for cabinet members and cabinet meetings, consolidated versions of primary laws, and aggregated data on lobbying.