With all of the partisan bickering and legislative gridlock, it’s nice to see an area where the left and the right agree. Whether conservative or liberal, Democratic or Republican, politicians agree on one thing…NEPOTISM (and free travel paid by lobbyists but that is a topic of another post).

In the age of daily corporate scandals and the increased scrutiny that they have brought on (i.e., Sarbanes-Oxley), it’s interesting to see that the pols feel that such transparency doesn’t apply to them or their campaigns. In fact, in the last two election cycles, lawmakers have put relatives on their staffs and funneled over $3 million dollars to them.

Lawmakers get around the law that forbids them from putting relatives on congressional payrolls by paying them with campaign dollars. While explaining why she paid her son $130,000 to run her PAC, California Senator Barbara Boxer claims that putting relatives on campaign staff is a good way to keep people from stealing. We won’t even try to follow that logic.

Barbara is not alone. From the Vermont Guardian:

California Rep. Zoe Lofgren paid $251,853 to her husband’s firm. Rep. Howard L. Berman paid family members $205,500. Rep. Bob Filner funneled $154,504, Rep. Howard P. “Buck” McKeon ($152,362), while Rep. Pete Stark paid his wife $119,000.

House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-TX, paid his wife and daughter $473,801 as campaign staff members. Vermont Rep. Bernie Sanders has used campaign donations to pay his wife and step daughter more than $150,000.

Rep. Dana Rohrabacher’s wife received $114,894 to run his campaign and Rep. Richard W. Pombo’s wife and brother received $357,325.

These are just a few examples of many. Note that just because a politician employs a family member doesn’t mean that there is any financial shenanigans or that the wife/husband/son/daughter wasn’t qualified for the job. But it would be nice if these pols thought highly enough to not put themselves in the positions where questions get asked and normal checks/balances are compromised. Furthermore, since the conflicts of interest are real enough that there is a law keeping family members off of congressional payrolls why can’t the pols see that the same reasoning shouldn’t apply to their campaigns.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 11th, 2005 at 7:24 am by Insider and is filed under Brilliant, but uncategorizable. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.