By 'on the side', I mean things like book deals and at the time legal insider trading. As for making a billion after being elected president in the past it was foundations you've set up and receive donations to, not directly like trump. I think the Clintons were probably the most extreme even taking it I remember a billion dollar donation from Saudi Arabia. But nothing comes even close to trump.
From Article II, Section 1:
The President shall, at stated Times, receive for his Services, a Compensation, which shall neither be encreased nor diminished during the Period for which he shall have been elected, and he shall not receive within that Period any other Emolument from the United States, or any of them.
Trump, on the other hand, openly goes out of his way to cash in on his office, even to the extent of accepting bribes in the form of planes from foreign countries, large donations of foreign and domestic powers via his cryptocurrency, and accepting direct payments for pardons.
I should note that bribery is one of the explicitly mentioned crimes for which impeachment is designed, as mentioned in Article II, Section 4:
The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.I don't know if he is daytrading now. Every day in the recent week it was "an Iran deal is imminent" during the day and "we'll bomb them" after market closure, followed by Iranian denials that a deal was ever imminent.
The guy has made ~3500 stock trades in the last 3 months, and there's a pattern of him publicly pumping stock by mentioning a company in a tweet or public statement.
The problem is, the framers of the Constitution believed the American people would never elect someone so criminal and unfit, so the President is exempt from many criminal laws, including those that would stop this.
The framers of the Constitution were looking at a different world, where there was not the instant communication and sense of one "America" that we have. They figured that, while attempts at corruption were inevitable, the different states would protect themselves by not allowing representatives from another state to succeed at any self-serving corruption. But the rise of national party instead of state as primary political identity (which Washington warned about), and the huge propaganda pipe that is the internet, have destroyed the (supposed) protection of many individual state identities.
Nixon resigned when he was told that he would likely be impeached. Unfortunately the current Republicans in Congress are completely spineless.
“Checks and balances.”
More like cheques and (bank) balances.