i love this. US laws regarding bribery are barely a notch above the honor system already.

the rules are basically “hey, you can take bribes in return for favors, but please make sure that your briber doesn’t say ‘I’m giving you this sack of money, conviently labeled “bribes”, as a bribe so you can do favors for me in exchange’ and you don’t say ‘understood, i will abuse my power to do favors for you in exchange for this bribe’—and as long as you don’t both say these things on record and label the money as ’bribes’ you’re good”…

… and this motherfucker’s like “let’s just do it anyway, we’ll get away with it so who cares”