[Code of Federal Regulations]
[Title 5, Volume 3]
[Revised as of January 1, 2005]
From the U.S. Government Printing Office via GPO Access
[CITE: 5CFR2634.802]

[Page 533-534]
 
                    TITLE 5--ADMINISTRATIVE PERSONNEL
 
                CHAPTER XVI--OFFICE OF GOVERNMENT ETHICS
 
PART 2634_EXECUTIVE BRANCH FINANCIAL DISCLOSURE, QUALIFIED TRUSTS, AND 
CERTIFICATES OF DIVESTITURE--Table of Contents
 
                       Subpart H_Ethics Agreements
 
Sec. 2634.802  Requirements.

    (a) Ethics agreement defined. The term ethics agreement shall 
include, for the purposes of this subpart, any oral or written promise 
by a reporting individual to undertake specific actions in order to 
alleviate an actual or apparent conflict of interest, such as:

[[Page 534]]

    (1) Preparation of a written instrument for recusing (disqualifying) 
the individual from one or more particular matters or categories of 
official action;
    (2) Divestiture of a financial interest;
    (3) Resignation from a position with a non-Federal business or other 
entity;
    (4) Procurement of a waiver pursuant to 18 U.S.C. 208(b)(1) or 
(b)(3); or
    (5) Establishment of a qualified blind or diversified trust under 
the Act and subpart D of this part.
    (b) Time limit. The ethics agreement shall specify that the 
individual must complete the action which he or she has agreed to 
undertake within a period not to exceed three months from the date of 
the agreement (or of Senate confirmation, if applicable). Exceptions to 
the three-month deadline can be made in cases of unusual hardship, as 
determined by the Office of Government Ethics, for those ethics 
agreements which are submitted to it (see Sec. 2634.803 (a), (b), or 
(c) of this subpart), or by the designated agency ethics official for 
all other ethics agreements.

    Example: An official of the ABC Aircraft Company is nominated to a 
Department of Defense position requiring the advice and consent of the 
Senate. As a condition of assuming the position, the individual has 
agreed to divest himself of his ABC Aircraft stock which he recently 
acquired while he was an officer with the company. However, the 
Securities and Exchange Commission prohibits officers of public 
corporations from deriving a profit from the sale of stock in the 
corporation in which they hold office within six months of acquiring the 
stock, and directs that any such profit must be returned to the issuing 
corporation or its stock holders. Since meeting the usual three-month 
time limit specified in this subpart for satisfying an ethics agreement 
might entail losing any profit that could be realized on the sale of 
this stock, the nominee requests that the limit be extended beyond the 
six-month period imposed by the Commission. Written approval would have 
to be obtained from the Office of Government Ethics to extend the 
customary three-month period.