Commerce Sec Ross nudged by OGE to divest his remaining conflicts of interest

In the spring of 2017, Trump's Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross brokered a “herculean” trade agreement allowing American companies to export (and consequently ship) liquefied natural gas to China. Ross seemed proud and happy about his accomplishment at the time, and that may have been simply because he owned stake in a company called Navigator Holdings.

Navigator is in the business of shipping liquefied gas across the globe, and its parent company owns several offshore tax-haven subsidiaries exposed in the Paradise Papers as having connections to prominent figures, including Commerce Secretary Ross. At one point, Ross owned a 55 percent stake in Navigator.

One of the biggest shipping clients of Navigator is the Russian energy company Sibur. Kirill Shamalov is an owner of Sibur as well as being a son-in-law of Russian President Vladimir Putin. Shamalov also owned a 20 percent stake in Navigator.

Last year, Secretary Ross agreed to divest his shares after his appointment to the Commerce Department. Apparently, that divestiture didn't happen exactly the way he promised it would. A letter from David Apol at the the US Office of Government Ethics dated July 12, 2018 advised Ross that, “[Y]our failure to divest created the potential for a serious criminal violation on your part and undermined public confidence.”

As a result, various media outlets are reporting today that Secretary Ross will be selling his remaining stock in various companies and transferring its value into US Treasuries.

Note that Ross' chief of Staff Wendy Teramoto has connections not only to Navigator Holdings, but also to a company Ross founded, WL Ross & Co, which is now owned by Invesco, another company in which Ross owns a stake that he will purportedly be selling soon.