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Donald Trump is using taxpayer dollars to enrich himself while asking Congress to fund his government.

Jim Watson/Getty Images

Multiple State Department websites were found promoting President Trump’s private club at Mar-a-Lago Monday, and not in particularly subtle ways.

As ethics lawyer and Trump watchdog Norm Eisen notes, this appears to violate the same federal conflict-of-interest rules Kellyanne Conway broke when she promoted Ivanka Trump’s fashion line from the White House briefing room, though this is far more intentional.

This kind of thing is becoming routine in Trump’s administration, in part because he’s fostering a culture of corruption in the government, and in part because Republicans in Congress have decided to let him get away with it. They could put a stop to the routine self-enrichment fairly easily, or force him to divest his assets and set up a blind trust, but they have chosen instead to do nothing.

The timing of this particular outrage is interesting, though, because it comes as the Trump administration is negotiating a temporary spending bill with Congress, to avoid a government shutdown at the end of the week. That legislation will require Democratic votes and that gives Democrats an opportunity to make issue of the fact that Trump wants to use these appropriations to advertise his commercial property. Whether they will take a stand here of not remains to be seen, but there’s an obvious logic to making Republicans explain why Democrats (or anyone!) should vote for this spending if Republicans intend to turn a blind eye when it flows directly into Trump’s pockets.