By Joe Crowe

President Donald Trump must reveal more information about his business dealings in other countries, according to Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn.

The public needs to be sure that Trump’s foreign policies are not designed to benefit his foreign interests, Blumenthal said Wednesday on CNN’s “New Day.”

“The president has a far-flung empire of 500 companies doing business in 20 different countries, and we really have no knowledge because he has failed to disclose about all of those business operations,” Blumenthal said in the interview.

“We can’t consent to what we don’t know. He has a duty, at the very least, to disclose what those deals and payments and benefits are, so that the American people know that he’s putting our interests first, and not his business interests,” the senator said.

“He cannot engage in these benefits and payments without consent of Congress. It’s more than disclosure,” Blumenthal said in the CNN interview.

Blumenthal said Trump’s praise for other countries’ leaders could be for business reasons.

“The American people deserve to know whether, when he praises Turkey or the Philippines’ leaders—he’s doing it because it is in our interest or because he has business deals there.”

The Connecticut Democrat is part of a group of more than 190 Democratic lawmakers who are suing Trump in federal court, saying that Trump had not sought approval for any payments that his businesses had gotten since he took office.

The Constitution in the “foreign emoluments” clause requires Trump to provide that information. “The president’s failure to tell us about these emoluments, to disclose the payments and benefits that he is receiving, mean that we cannot do our job,” Blumenthal said during a Tuesday conference call.