Thank you for the question, and thank you for sending me in advance a letter of your concerns.
Let's start from the beginning. We don't approve travel. There is no provision in the act. We don't do that.
What we do is approve.... If somebody receives a gratuity or a gift, he or she can come to us and ask, “Is this okay or do I have conflict of interest?” We give them an answer. We do that on a confidential basis. It's up to the requester to decide whether he wants to make it public or not, etc. We do not comment on any of this.
In this case, all I can assure you—I assume; I wasn't here—is that often, with issues of this nature, a request would have been made and an answer would have been given.