Hillary, takes a community...
"It takes a community to bring up a child."
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Once brought up BY THE "community"....constant BABYSITTING is NEEDED....like it or NOT!       |
Sunday, May 24, 2015
Liberals-Progressive and all OTHER EVIL Babysit the Ambitious IMPAIRED
Thursday, May 21, 2015
What is the DIFFERENCE with EVIL....BEING evil, and Mental Illness? #38 &39 Communist Manifesto
What is the DIFFERENCE with EVIL....BEING evil, and Mental Illness?
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| The Difference from Evil and Mental Illness |
The Communist Manifest number #38 & #39
38. Transfer some of the powers of arrest from the police to social agencies. Treat all behavioral problems as psychiatric disorders which no one but psychiatrists can understand [or treat].
39. Dominate the psychiatric profession and use mental health laws as a
means of gaining coercive control over those who oppose Communist
goals.
The Communist Takeover Of
America - 45 Declared Goals
From Greg Swank
12-4-2
America - 45 Declared Goals
From Greg Swank
12-4-2
- You are about to read a list of 45 goals that found their way down the halls of our great Capitol back in 1963. As you read this, 62 years later, you should be shocked by the events that have played themselves out.
- Communist Goals (1963) Congressional Record--Appendix, pp. A34-A35 January 10, 1963
- Current Communist Goals EXTENSION OF REMARKS OF HON. A. S. HERLONG, JR. OF FLORIDA IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES Thursday, January 10, 1963 .
- Mr. HERLONG. Mr. Speaker, Mrs. Patricia Nordman of De Land, Fla., is an ardent and articulate opponent of communism, and until recently published the De Land Courier, which she dedicated to the purpose of alerting the public to the dangers of communism in America.
- At Mrs. Nordman's request, I include in the RECORD, under unanimous consent, the following "Current Communist Goals," which she identifies as an excerpt from "The Naked Communist," by Cleon Skousen:
- [From "The Naked Communist," by Cleon Skousen]
- 1. U.S. acceptance of coexistence as the only alternative to atomic war.
- 2. U.S. willingness to capitulate in preference to engaging in atomic war.
- 3. Develop the illusion that total disarmament [by] the United States would be a demonstration of moral strength.
- 4. Permit free trade between all nations regardless of Communist affiliation and regardless of whether or not items could be used for war.
- 5. Extension of long-term loans to Russia and Soviet satellites.
- 6. Provide American aid to all nations regardless of Communist domination.
- 7. Grant recognition of Red China. Admission of Red China to the U.N.
- 8. Set up East and West Germany as separate states in spite of Khrushchev's promise in 1955 to settle the German question by free elections under supervision of the U.N.
- 9. Prolong the conferences to ban atomic tests because the United States has agreed to suspend tests as long as negotiations are in progress.
- 10. Allow all Soviet satellites individual representation in the U.N.
- 11. Promote the U.N. as the only hope for mankind. If its charter is rewritten, demand that it be set up as a one-world government with its own independent armed forces. (Some Communist leaders believe the world can be taken over as easily by the U.N. as by Moscow. Sometimes these two centers compete with each other as they are now doing in the Congo.)
- 12. Resist any attempt to outlaw the Communist Party.
- 13. Do away with all loyalty oaths.
- 14. Continue giving Russia access to the U.S. Patent Office.
- 15. Capture one or both of the political parties in the United States.
- 16. Use technical decisions of the courts to weaken basic American institutions by claiming their activities violate civil rights.
- 17. Get control of the schools. Use them as transmission belts for socialism and current Communist propaganda. Soften the curriculum. Get control of teachers' associations. Put the party line in textbooks.
- 18. Gain control of all student newspapers.
- 19. Use student riots to foment public protests against programs or organizations which are under Communist attack.
- 20. Infiltrate the press. Get control of book-review assignments, editorial writing, policy-making positions.
- 21. Gain control of key positions in radio, TV, and motion pictures.
- 22. Continue discrediting American culture by degrading all forms of artistic expression. An American Communist cell was told to "eliminate all good sculpture from parks and buildings, substitute shapeless, awkward and meaningless forms."
- 23. Control art critics and directors of art museums. "Our plan is to promote ugliness, repulsive, meaningless art."
- 24. Eliminate all laws governing obscenity by calling them "censorship" and a violation of free speech and free press.
- 25. Break down cultural standards of morality by promoting pornography and obscenity in books, magazines, motion pictures, radio, and TV.
- 26. Present homosexuality, degeneracy and promiscuity as "normal, natural, healthy."
- 27. Infiltrate the churches and replace revealed religion with "social" religion. Discredit the Bible and emphasize the need for intellectual maturity, which does not need a "religious crutch."
- 28. Eliminate prayer or any phase of religious expression in the schools on the ground that it violates the principle of "separation of church and state."
- 29. Discredit the American Constitution by calling it inadequate, old-fashioned, out of step with modern needs, a hindrance to cooperation between nations on a worldwide basis.
- 30. Discredit the American Founding Fathers. Present them as selfish aristocrats who had no concern for the "common man."
- 31. Belittle all forms of American culture and discourage the teaching of American history on the ground that it was only a minor part of the "big picture." Give more emphasis to Russian history since the Communists took over.
- 32. Support any socialist movement to give centralized control over any part of the culture--education, social agencies, welfare programs, mental health clinics, etc.
- 33. Eliminate all laws or procedures which interfere with the operation of the Communist apparatus.
- 34. Eliminate the House Committee on Un-American Activities.
- 35. Discredit and eventually dismantle the FBI.
- 36. Infiltrate and gain control of more unions.
- 37. Infiltrate and gain control of big business.
- 38. Transfer some of the powers of arrest from the police to social agencies. Treat all behavioral problems as psychiatric disorders which no one but psychiatrists can understand [or treat].
- 39. Dominate the psychiatric profession and use mental health laws as a means of gaining coercive control over those who oppose Communist goals.
- 40. Discredit the family as an institution. Encourage promiscuity and easy divorce.
- 41. Emphasize the need to raise children away from the negative influence of parents. Attribute prejudices, mental blocks and retarding of children to suppressive influence of parents.
- 42. Create the impression that violence and insurrection are legitimate aspects of the American tradition; that students and special-interest groups should rise up and use ["]united force["] to solve economic, political or social problems.
- 43. Overthrow all colonial governments before native populations are ready for self-government.
- 44. Internationalize the Panama Canal.
- 45. Repeal the Connally reservation so the United States cannot prevent the World Court from seizing jurisdiction [over domestic problems. Give the World Court jurisdiction] over nations and individuals alike.
- Note by Webmaster: The Congressional Record back this far has not be digitized and posted on the Internet.
- It will probably be available at your nearest library that is a federal repository. Call them and ask them. Your college library is probably a repository. This is an excellent source of government records. Another source are your Congress Critters. They should be more than happy to help you in this matter. You will find the Ten Planks of the Communist Manifesto interesting at this point.
- Webmaster Forest Glen Durland found the document in the library.
- Sources are listed below.
- Microfilm: California State University at San Jose Clark Library, Government Floor Phone (408)924-2770 Microfilm Call Number: J 11.R5
- Congressional Record, Vol. 109 88th Congress, 1st Session Appendix Pages A1-A2842 Jan. 9-May 7, 1963 Reel 12
- zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
9/30/2015
Are you a Christian? your shot in the head.
if not...you are shot in the leg...We don't know THE "name" ...right? my name is tucker, NOT sucker..
The shooter ID'd. No Name is HIS name.
It must be. Why not give us the name OR the identity who he was....If he was WHITE you would KNOW it NOW
If he was Christian...YOU WOULD know it NOW
If he was a Conservative ...YOU WOULD KNOW IT NOW...so ....who just IS NO NAME....
http://comunistmanifesto101.blogspot.com/2015/10/20-year-old-no-name-shooter-we-know.html
if not...you are shot in the leg...We don't know THE "name" ...right? my name is tucker, NOT sucker..
The shooter ID'd. No Name is HIS name.
It must be. Why not give us the name OR the identity who he was....If he was WHITE you would KNOW it NOW
If he was Christian...YOU WOULD know it NOW
If he was a Conservative ...YOU WOULD KNOW IT NOW...so ....who just IS NO NAME....
http://comunistmanifesto101.blogspot.com/2015/10/20-year-old-no-name-shooter-we-know.html
Wednesday, May 20, 2015
"Black Power" is Islamic incarnate - LiberalBlack Crime syndicate....no Religion...a cult..of shuck-jive
There is no doubt in my mind..
Unfortunately, just after Carter had called an Uber to head home, gunfire erupted. Carter and Murray were able to get out, but they realized Parker was still inside and turned back to get her, hiding out in the bathroom with several others.Carter says the shooter, Omar Mateen, then arrived in the bathroom and continued to fire. Carter was struck in the legs, while Parker was hit in the side and Murray was
struck in the arm. Carter felt a body fall on her legs, pinning her down.
Carter then recalled the shooter asking if there were “any black people” in the bathroom, and when a man responded that there were “six or seven of us,”
Mateen said that he “didn’t have a problem with black people” and said that “you guys have suffered enough.”
Unfortunately, just after Carter had called an Uber to head home, gunfire erupted. Carter and Murray were able to get out, but they realized Parker was still inside and turned back to get her, hiding out in the bathroom with several others.Carter says the shooter, Omar Mateen, then arrived in the bathroom and continued to fire. Carter was struck in the legs, while Parker was hit in the side and Murray was
struck in the arm. Carter felt a body fall on her legs, pinning her down.
Carter then recalled the shooter asking if there were “any black people” in the bathroom, and when a man responded that there were “six or seven of us,”
Mateen said that he “didn’t have a problem with black people” and said that “you guys have suffered enough.”
 |
| First hand experience watch Islam recruit blacks in Prison. |
that "Black Power"...is Islamic ...by design...by effort, and by documented result.
The false narrative that much like the "black thing" the "Islam thing" are the SAME! One for "local consumption" the latter for the NWO consumption.
Ben brings home this point with pure, unadulterated, can't dispute MATH!
The false narrative that much like the "black thing" the "Islam thing" are the SAME! One for "local consumption" the latter for the NWO consumption.
Ben brings home this point with pure, unadulterated, can't dispute MATH!
Ben Shapiro: The Myth of the Tiny Radical Muslim Minority
https://youtu.be/g7TAAw3oQvg
Islam & Mafia....Similar
Finally, we will consider what accounts for these many similarities between Islam and the mafia, including from an historical perspective.
1. Allah and Muhammad/Godfather and Underboss
The padrino of larger mafia organizations and families—literally, the “godfather” or “boss of bosses”—has absolute control over his subordinates and is often greatly feared by them for his ruthlessness. He has an “underboss,” a right-hand man who issues his orders and enforces his will. The godfather himself is often inaccessible; mafia members need to go through the underboss or other high ranking associates.
Compare this with the relationship between Allah and his “messenger” Muhammad (in Arabic, Muhammad is most commonly referred to as al-rasul, “the messenger”). Unlike the Judeo-Christian God—a personal God, a Father, that according to Christ is to be communed with directly (Matt 6:9)—Islam’s god, Allah, is unreachable, unknowable, untouchable. Like the godfather, he is inaccessible. His orders are revealed by his messenger, Muhammad.
If the Judeo-Christian God calls on the faithful to “come now, let us reason together” (Isaiah 1:18), Allah says “Do not ask questions about things that, if made known to you, would only pain you” (Koran 5:101). Just follow orders.
2. A “Piece of the Action”
The godfather and his underboss always get a “piece of the action”—a “cut”—of all spoils acquired by their subordinates.
So do Allah and his messenger, Muhammad. Koran 8:41 informs Muslims that “one-fifth of all war-booty you acquire goes to Allah and the messenger” (followed by Muhammad’s family and finally the needy).
3. Assassinations
The godfather, through his underboss, regularly sends mafia men to make “hits”—to assassinate—those deemed enemies of the family.
So did Allah and his messenger. One example: A non-Muslim poet, Ka‘b ibn Ashraf, insulted Muhammad, prompting the latter to exclaim, “Who will kill this man who has hurt Allah and his messenger?” A young Muslim named Ibn Maslama volunteered on condition that to get close enough to assassinate Ka‘b he be allowed to lie to the poet.
Allah’s messenger agreed. Ibn Maslama traveled to Ka‘b and began to denigrate Islam and Muhammad until his disaffection became so convincing that the poet took him into his confidence. Soon thereafter, Ibn Maslama appeared with another Muslim and, while Ka‘b’s guard was down, slaughtered the poet, bringing his head to Muhammad to the usual triumphant cries of “Allahu Akbar!”
4. Circumstance is Everything
While the mafia adheres to a general code of conduct, the godfather issues more fluid orders according to circumstances.
This is reminiscent of the entire “revelation” of the Koran, where later verses/commands contradict earlier verses/commands, depending on circumstances (known in Islamic jurisprudence as al-nāsikh wal-mansūkh, or the doctrine of abrogation).
Thus, whereas Allah supposedly told the prophet that “there is no compulsion in religion” (Koran 2:256), once the messenger grew strong enough, Allah issued new revelations calling for all-out war/jihad till Islam became supreme (Koran 8:39, 9:5, 9:29, etc.).
While other religions and scriptures may have contradictions, only Islam rationalizes them through abrogation—that is, by giving prominence to later verses which are seen as the “latest” decision of the deity.
5. Clan Loyalty
Loyalty is fundamental in the mafia. Following elaborate rituals of blood oaths, mafia members are expected to maintain absolute loyalty to the family, on pain of death.
Similarly, mafia members are expected always to be available for the family—“even if your wife is about to give birth,” as one of the mafia’s “ten commandments” puts it—and to defend the godfather and his honor, even if it costs their lives.
Compare this to the widespread violence and upheavals that occur whenever Allah or his prophet is offended—whenever non-Muslim “infidels” blaspheme them. Or, as Bill Maher put it: “Its’ the only religion that acts like the mafia, that will f***ing kill you if you say the wrong thing, draw the wrong picture, or write the wrong book.”
Islam’s “Loyalty and Enmity” doctrine (al-wala’ wa’l bara’)—which calls on Muslims to be loyal to one another even if they dislike each other—is especially illustrative. Koran 9:71 declares that “The believing [Muslim] men and believing [Muslim] women are allies of one another” (see also 8:72-75). And according to Muhammad, “A Muslim is the brother of a Muslim. He neither oppresses him nor humiliates him nor looks down upon him…. All things of a Muslim are inviolable for his brother in faith: his blood, his wealth, and his honor”—precisely those three things that mafia members respect among each other. This is why Muslims like U.S. Army Major Nidal Hassan, whose “worst nightmare” was to be deployed to fight fellow Muslims, often lash out.)
6. Death to Traitors
Once a fledging mafia member takes the oath of loyalty to the mafia—including the Omertà code of silence and secrecy—trying to leave the “family” is seen as a betrayal and punishable by death. Any family member, great or small, is given authority to kill the traitor, the “turncoat.”
Compare this to Islam. To be born to a Muslim father immediately makes the newborn a Muslim—there are no oaths to be taken, much less any choice in the matter. And, according to Islamic law, if born Muslims at any point in their lives choose to leave Islam, they are deemed “apostates”—traitors—and punished including by death. Any zealous Muslim, not just the authorities, is justified in killing the apostate (hence why Muslim families that kill apostate children are rarely if ever prosecuted).
In the words of Muhammad—the messenger (“underboss”) of Allah (“godfather”): “Whoever leaves his Islamic faith, kill him.”
7. Distrust and Dislike of “Outsiders”
Aside from loyalty to the family, mafia members are also expected not to befriend or freely associate with “outsiders”—who by nature are not to be trusted, as they are not of the “family”—unless such a “friendship” helps advance the family’s position.
Similarly, the second half of the doctrine of Loyalty and Enmity—the enmity (al-bara’)—calls on Muslims to maintain distance from and bear enmity for all non-Muslims, or “infidels.”
Thus Koran 5:51 warns Muslims against “taking the Jews and Christians as friends and allies … whoever among you takes them for friends and allies, he is surely one of them.” According to the mainstream Islamic exegesis of al-Tabari, Koran 5:51 means that the Muslim who “allies with them [non-Muslims] and enables them against the believers, that same one is a member of their faith and community,” that is, a defector, an apostate, an enemy.
Similar scriptures include Koran 4:89, 5:54, 6:40, 9:23, and 58:22; the latter simply states that true Muslims do not befriend non-Muslims—“even if they be their fathers, sons, brothers, or kin.” Koran 60:1 declares, “O you who believe! Do not take my enemy and your enemy [non-believers] for friends: would you offer them love while they deny what has come to you of the truth [i.e., while they deny Islam]?” And Koran 4:144 declares “O you who believe! Do not take the infidels as allies instead of the believers. Do you wish to give Allah [“godfather”] a clear case against yourselves?”
8. Deception and Dissimulation
As mentioned, close relations to non-mafia individuals that prove advantageous to the family (for example, collaboration with a “crooked cop”) are permissible—as long as the mafia keeps a safe distance, keeps the outsider at arm’s length.
Compare this to Koran 3:28 which commands “believers not to take infidels for friends and allies instead of believers… unless you but guard yourselves against them, taking precautions.” According to the standard Koran commentary of Tabari, “taking precautions” means:
If you [Muslims] are under their [non-Muslims’] authority, fearing for yourselves, behave loyally to them with your tongue while harboring inner animosity for them … [but know that] Allah has forbidden believers from being friendly or on intimate terms with the infidels rather than other believers—except when infidels are above them [in authority]. Should that be the case, let them act friendly towards them while preserving their religion.After interpreting Koran 3:28 as meaning that Muslims may “protect” themselves “through outward show” when under non-Muslim authority, Ibn Kathir, perhaps Islam’s most celebrated exegete, quotes Islam’s prophet (“underboss”) saying: “Truly, we smile to the faces of some people, while our hearts curse them.”
Similarly, a few years ago, Sheikh Muhammad Hassan—a leading Salafi cleric in Egypt—asserted on live television that, while Muslims should never smile to the faces of non-Muslims, they should smile, however insincerely, if so doing helps empower Islam, especially in the context of da‘wa.
The idea of hating “outsiders” is apparently so ingrained in Islam that another leading Salafi cleric, Dr. Yasser al-Burhami, insists that, while Muslim men may marry Christian and Jewish women, they must hate them in their heart—and show them that they hate them in the hopes that they convert to the “family” of Islam.
(For more on the doctrine of “Loyalty and Enmity,” including references to the exegetical sources quoted above, see al-Qaeda leader Dr. Ayman Zawahiri’s comprehensive treatise by that name in The Al Qaeda Reader, pgs. 63-115.)
9. “An Offer You Can’t Refuse”
Although the novel-turned-movie, The Godfather, is fictitious, it also captures much of the mafia’s modus operandi. Consider, for example, that most famous of lines—“I’m going to make him an offer he can’t refuse”—spoken by the Godfather to one of his “godsons,” an aspiring actor and singer. After being turned down by a studio director for a role that he desperately wanted, the godson turned to his Godfather for aid.
As the movie progresses, it becomes clear that the offer that can’t be refused consists of nothing less than violence and death threats: after the Godfather’s messenger to the director asking that the actor be given the role is again rejected, the director awakens the next morning to find the bloodied and decapitated head of his favorite stallion in bed with him. The godson subsequently gets the movie role.
Throughout the context of the entire Godfather trilogy (which captures well the mafia’s approach to business) making someone “an offer they can’t refuse” means “do as I say or suffer the consequences,” possibly death.
Compare this to Islam’s threefold choice. On Muhammad’s orders, whenever Muslims conquer a territory in the name of Islam, its non-Muslim inhabitants are given three choices: 1) convert to Islam (“join the family”), 2) keep your religious identity but pay tribute (jizya, see below) and live as an “outsider,” a subjugated dhimmi or 3) execution.
Throughout history, converting to Islam has been an “offer” that countless non-Muslims could not refuse. In fact, this “offer” is responsible for transforming much of the Middle East and North Africa, which were Christian-majority in the 7th century when the jihad burst forth from Arabia, into the “Muslim world.”
And this offer is still alive and well today. For example, several older and disabled Christians who were not able to join the exodus out of Islamic State controlled territories opted to convert to Islam rather than die.
Like the mafia, then, Islam’s offer to conquered non-Muslims (“outsiders”) is basically “join our ‘family,’ help us and we will help you; refuse and we hurt you.”
10. The “Protection” Racket
Once the mafia takes over a territory, one of the primary ways it profits is by collecting “protection money” from its inhabitants. While the protection racket has several aspects, one in particular is akin to an Islamic practice: coercing people in the mafia’s territory to pay money for “protection,” ostensibly against outside elements; in fact, the protection bought is from the mafia itself—that is, extortion money, or pizzo. Potential “clients” who refuse to pay for the mafia’s “protection” often have their property vandalized and are routinely threatened and harassed.
Compare the collection of pizzo with the Islamic concept of jizya: The word jizya appears in Koran 9:29: “Fight those among the People of the Book [Christians and Jews] who do not believe in Allah nor the Last Day, nor forbid what Allah and his Messenger have forbidden, nor embrace the religion of truth, until they pay the jizya with willing submission and feel themselves subdued (emphasis added).”
In the hadith, the Messenger of Allah, Muhammad—in our analogy, the “underboss”—regularly calls on Muslims to demand jizya from non-Muslims: “If they refuse to accept Islam,” said the prophet, “demand from them the jizya. If they agree to pay, accept it from them and hold off your hands. If they refuse to pay jizya, seek Allah’s help and fight them.”
The root meaning of the Arabic word “jizya” is simply to “repay” or “recompense,” basically to “compensate” for something. According to the Hans Wehr Dictionary, the standard Arabic-English dictionary, jizya is something that “takes the place” of something else, or “serves instead.”
Simply put, conquered non-Muslims were to purchase their lives, which were otherwise forfeit to their Muslim conquerors, with money. As one medieval jurist succinctly puts it, “their lives and their possessions are only protected by reason of payment of jizya” (Crucified Again, p. 22).
And to top it off, just as the mafia rationalizes its collection of “protection money” by portraying it as money that buys mafia protection against “outsiders”—when, as mentioned, the money/tribute serves only to protect the client from the mafia itself—so too do Islam’s apologists portray the collection of jizya as money meant to buy Muslim protection from outsiders, when in fact the money/jizya buys protection from Muslims themselves.
Conclusion: Mafia—What’s In a Word?
What accounts for all these similarities between Islam and the mafia? One clue is found in the fact that the very word “mafia,” which means “hostility to the law, boldness,” is derived from an Arabic word, mahya, which in translation means “bragging, boasting, bravado, and swaggering.”
This etymology is a reminder that Sicily, birthplace of the mafia, was under Arab/Islamic domination for over 200 years. Aside from a borrowed etymology, could some of the mafia’s modus operandi also have been borrowed from Islam? Isolated on their island, could native Sicilians have co-opted the techniques of social controls that they had lived under and learned from their former overlords—albeit without their Islamic veneer?
The mafia is not the only historical example of a non-Muslim criminal organization to be influenced by Islam. For example, the Thuggees — whence we get the word “thug” — were a brotherhood of allied bandits and assassins who waylaid and savagely murdered travelers in India, often by first feigning friendship. Although they were later associated with the Hindu cult of Kali, the original Thuggees were all Muslim. As late as the 19th century, a large number of Thuggees captured and convicted by the British were Muslim.
The similarities are clear: Along with assassinating his opponents, including, as seen, through treachery, Muhammad also personally engaged in banditry, ransacking the caravans of enemy tribes.
And if the words “mafia” and “thug” have Arabic/Islamic etymologies, the words “assassinate” and “assassin” are derived from a Medieval Islamic sect: the Hashashin, who pioneered the use of political assassination—with promises of a hedonistic paradise for the assassin who almost certainly died—in the name of Islam.
At any rate, when HBO personality Bill Maher recently proclaimed that Islam is “the only religion that acts like the mafia, that will f***ing kill you if you say the wrong thing, draw the wrong picture, or write the wrong book,” he was barely touching on the similarities between the mafia and other criminal organizations, and Islam.
Hillary the Presumptive Precedent...err President....Suckers! The best she can do...is to PRESUME
#hillaryclinton 1 Million to Defeat Hillary Clinton Stop Hillary In 2016 Hillary Clinton
Mrs. BillsWife Clinton
New meaning to Marrying UP! #marryingup
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| Hillary's ONE...her ONLY ONE accomplishment was marrying Bill Clinton.. |
As in TO assume....Presume....makes an ASS out of YOU & ME....Presume ONLY HILLARY's Ass
 |
| Why SHOULD I do ANYTHING I do NOT have to.....Ya'll. |
Nixon on the Release of the Water Gate Tapes?
Hillary supporters can't fine ONE think to ad to a list of "accomplishments."
Largest Auto RECALL-Air Bags or "don't let a crisis go to waste" Suckers!
My name is Tucker, NOT Sucker!
Pass the SMELL TEST?
Carnack say "what is...playing "we the people" for fools?
Anti-Business play?
Pass the SMELL TEST?
 |
| Add c Largest Auto recall...air bag....50 million.....= 6 deaths (only) and one hundred injuries.. |
 |
| Is this much to do about "nothing?" or is it the Power Grab via Regulation by the EVIL left? are we simply |
Carnack say "what is...playing "we the people" for fools?
Anti-Business play?
 |
Carnack says the answer is What is playing "we the people" for FOOLS - Anti-business play?  |
Monday, May 18, 2015
If I knew Then, THEN what I know NOW. I would be Carnac the Magnificent on my way to the HORSE Races.
Full Definition of ENTRAPMENT
1
2
: the action of luring an individual into committing a crime in order to prosecute the person for it  |
| If I knew OBAMA would be adverse to our success in Iraq, I would of NEVER |
The media’s dogged determination to chase every Republican
presidential contender down and pummel them for comments about the Iraq
War is remarkable to behold, since they are simultaneously willing to
let the only 2016 candidate who voted in favor of the war skate
by without answering questions about it, or anything else for that
matter. While Hillary Clinton is given months to prepare for her ninth question
from the press since declaring a candidacy, every Republican is
peppered with heavy fire from a throng of journalists on an hourly
basis.
Much has been made of the remarkable inability of the Republican candidate actually named “Bush” to express a clear position on the Iraq war. Senator
has also been accused of flip-floppery, because just over a month ago he unambiguously declared the war was not a mistake, and said “the world is a better place because Saddam Hussein doesn’t run Iraq.” However, he now says he would not have voted in favor of the war. Rubio spokesman Alex Conant clarified to CNN that the Senator stands by his earlier statements, thinks the decision to go to war was correct at the time given the intelligence at hand, but says he would not approve of the war knowing what we know now, which are the exact terms of the question media Democrats are hammering Republicans with. “Bush did not make a mistake when he ordered invasion given intelligence and Saddam’s actions,” said Conant.
The problem with squaring this particular circle is that Rubio’s March 30 comments forcefully asserted the Iraq War was not a mistake, which means failing to invade Iraq would have been a mistake, even with the benefit of hindsight and the information available in 2015.
Rubio can reconcile those positions logically, but he needs to do it explicitly, keeping in mind that his speaking skills and foreign policy focus are major bullet points on his presidential resume. He cannot leave this to spokesmen, or the guesswork of supportive op-ed writers. As he crafts his definitive statement on Iraq, Rubio should clearly reference his past statements, remain keenly aware that he stands accused of flip-flopping in the first degree, and understand why the media keeps dropping this question, with its “if we knew then what we know now” payload, on Republicans.
First, here is what Rubio said on March 30, with the necessary context, from an appearance on Fox News’ “The Five.” After discussing the dangers of growing Iranian influence in ISIS-torn Iraq, host Julie Roginsky noted that Saddam Hussein’s Iraq was seen as “a great counterweight to Iran,” so his removal and the subsequent deterioration of Iraq empowered the mullahs of Tehran.
“Was it a mistake to go to war in Iraq?” Roginsky asked.
Rubio’s response, in full:
As CNN notes, this position is consistent with the one Rubio expressed on their “State of the Union” show in 2010.
However, during a Q&A session at the Council on Foreign Relations on Wednesday, Rubio said he did not think “Congress would have voted in favor of the authorization” for invading Iraq if they knew everything that was known today.
“Not only would I not have been in favor of it, but President George W. Bush would not have,” the Senator asserted.
It is interesting to watch the Democrat media rush forward with these “hindsight” questions when their man Barack Obama reacts so bitterly to questions about whether his much more recent Iraq pullout, which paved the way for ISIS to invade, was a mistake in hindsight. Apparently hindsight is valid when peering back at 2002, but not 2011.
One reason we are getting all these “if you knew then what we know now” questions about the Iraq War is to smokescreen the real criticism of Obama’s failure. His catastrophic mistakes in Iraq were obvious given what was known at the time, and smarter men tried to warn him about. He ignored them, and the Iraqis, because he had a political agenda that involved convincing the American people that terrorism had been smashed, al-Qaeda was “decimated and on the run,” and ISIS was but the “junior varsity league” of terror.
Obama and Clinton supporters are desperate to reframe the critique of Obama’s foreign policy as “would you have worked harder on that Status of Forces agreement with Iraq, if you knew ISIS would invade?” because it makes him look better, and makes his critics look unreasonable. “Would you have supported George Bush on the Iraq War, if you knew what would happen?” is a tactic to set them up as hypocrites for denying Obama comparable benefit of the doubt, or to retroactively pin the rise of ISIS on George Bush.
Every Republican candidate who ever said anything supportive of the Iraq War, whether they held any public office in 2002 or not, will be accused of flip-flopping if they now concede they would not have voted for it with the benefit of hindsight.
Also, media liberals would very much like to get hawkish Republicans on the record saying the Iraq War was a complete blunder, to dispirit the Republican Party’s supporters in the military community. It would complete the process of absolving the lunatic Left of responsibility for their excesses during the latter Bush years.
Rubio was correct in that Fox News interview to challenge sanguine assumptions about the pastoral scenery on the road not taken. We cannot say what the murderous Saddam Hussein would have done if left in power. The brief for war presented by the Bush Administration covered far more than his drive to obtain nuclear weapons, which was not anywhere near as sated as history revisionists would have us believe. Flagrant defiance of U.N. resolutions, without consequence, was destroying the credibility of an international institution liberals claim to deeply believe in. Iran and other bad actors would have been inspired to even greater defiance… and as the utter debacle of Obama’s “nuclear negotiations” illustrates, the mullahs aren’t exactly model citizens in this timeline.
As for ISIS, there is no reason to feel confident that Saddam would have kept them bottled up in Syria or neutralized them. ISIS could easily have ended up in an alliance with Saddam’s Iraq – the remnants of his Baath party certainly seem to get along with them well.
Supporters of the Iraq war had a theory that establishing a purple-finger beachhead for democracy, after decapitating the Hussein regime, would make the Middle East more stable by giving it a shining example to counter the bloody allure of Islamist fundamentalism. It didn’t work out that way… but was it absolutely, 100 percent foolish for them to try, given the post-9/11 atmosphere? It is not as if Democrats can claim to have learned any lessons about the folly of regime change, since Obama and Clinton did the same thing in Libya – even more unilaterally, and with even more hideous results.
There is a way for a gifted orator like
to explain that he has learned those lessons– that he is not interested in second-guessing the past, or speculating about what he would have done, if he had been in position to cast the vote Hillary Clinton actually did cast. It’s not unreasonable to take stock of mistakes that have been made, and gambles that didn’t pay off, while also understanding positive consequences, and admitting that hindsight really isn’t 20/20. Even those who disagree with the vision Rubio articulates would respect his willingness to stand by everything he has said, acknowledge that it seems at variance with what he now says he would have done in 2002, and explain why it is not 2002 any more. “It wasn’t a mistake, but I wouldn’t have done it” is tricky political ground, but it can be held.
rt.com/big-government/2015/05/14/rubio-iraq-wasnt-a-mistake-but-i-wouldnt-have-done-it/ Much has been made of the remarkable inability of the Republican candidate actually named “Bush” to express a clear position on the Iraq war. Senator
has also been accused of flip-floppery, because just over a month ago he unambiguously declared the war was not a mistake, and said “the world is a better place because Saddam Hussein doesn’t run Iraq.” However, he now says he would not have voted in favor of the war. Rubio spokesman Alex Conant clarified to CNN that the Senator stands by his earlier statements, thinks the decision to go to war was correct at the time given the intelligence at hand, but says he would not approve of the war knowing what we know now, which are the exact terms of the question media Democrats are hammering Republicans with. “Bush did not make a mistake when he ordered invasion given intelligence and Saddam’s actions,” said Conant.
The problem with squaring this particular circle is that Rubio’s March 30 comments forcefully asserted the Iraq War was not a mistake, which means failing to invade Iraq would have been a mistake, even with the benefit of hindsight and the information available in 2015.
Rubio can reconcile those positions logically, but he needs to do it explicitly, keeping in mind that his speaking skills and foreign policy focus are major bullet points on his presidential resume. He cannot leave this to spokesmen, or the guesswork of supportive op-ed writers. As he crafts his definitive statement on Iraq, Rubio should clearly reference his past statements, remain keenly aware that he stands accused of flip-flopping in the first degree, and understand why the media keeps dropping this question, with its “if we knew then what we know now” payload, on Republicans.
First, here is what Rubio said on March 30, with the necessary context, from an appearance on Fox News’ “The Five.” After discussing the dangers of growing Iranian influence in ISIS-torn Iraq, host Julie Roginsky noted that Saddam Hussein’s Iraq was seen as “a great counterweight to Iran,” so his removal and the subsequent deterioration of Iraq empowered the mullahs of Tehran.
“Was it a mistake to go to war in Iraq?” Roginsky asked.
Rubio’s response, in full:
No, I don’t believe that it was. The world is a better place because Saddam Hussein doesn’t run Iraq. Here’s what I think might have happened, had we not gone in. You might had an arms race between Iraq and Iran, they both would have pursed a weapon. We would be dealing with two problems, not just one. We forget that Iraq, at the time of the invasion, was in open defiance of numerous United Nations Security Council resolutions, that the United Nations refused to enforce. They refused to comply with allowing inspectors in, repeatedly. This was a country whose leader had gassed his own people on numerous occasions.Rubio went on to stress that whatever hindsight revealed the actual state of Iraq’s nuclear weapons program to be, the dictator “was in open violation of United Nations Security Council resolutions, including not allowing inspectors to come in on the ground, et cetera, and the world refused to enforce it.”
So I think hindsight is always 20/20, but we don’t know what the world would look like if Saddam Hussein was still there. But I doubt it would look better in terms of — it would be worse — or just as bad for different reasons.
I think it’s very difficult to predict… I think — a better notion is, at the end of the Iraq war, Iraq had an opportunity to have a stable, peaceful future. The U.S. pulled out, completely abandoning it to Maliki, who then proceeded to move forward on these very aggressive strategies against the Sunni. Creating the intellectual and — environment, that allowed ISIS to come back in and take advantage of what’s happening.
As CNN notes, this position is consistent with the one Rubio expressed on their “State of the Union” show in 2010.
However, during a Q&A session at the Council on Foreign Relations on Wednesday, Rubio said he did not think “Congress would have voted in favor of the authorization” for invading Iraq if they knew everything that was known today.
“Not only would I not have been in favor of it, but President George W. Bush would not have,” the Senator asserted.
It is interesting to watch the Democrat media rush forward with these “hindsight” questions when their man Barack Obama reacts so bitterly to questions about whether his much more recent Iraq pullout, which paved the way for ISIS to invade, was a mistake in hindsight. Apparently hindsight is valid when peering back at 2002, but not 2011.
One reason we are getting all these “if you knew then what we know now” questions about the Iraq War is to smokescreen the real criticism of Obama’s failure. His catastrophic mistakes in Iraq were obvious given what was known at the time, and smarter men tried to warn him about. He ignored them, and the Iraqis, because he had a political agenda that involved convincing the American people that terrorism had been smashed, al-Qaeda was “decimated and on the run,” and ISIS was but the “junior varsity league” of terror.
Obama and Clinton supporters are desperate to reframe the critique of Obama’s foreign policy as “would you have worked harder on that Status of Forces agreement with Iraq, if you knew ISIS would invade?” because it makes him look better, and makes his critics look unreasonable. “Would you have supported George Bush on the Iraq War, if you knew what would happen?” is a tactic to set them up as hypocrites for denying Obama comparable benefit of the doubt, or to retroactively pin the rise of ISIS on George Bush.
Every Republican candidate who ever said anything supportive of the Iraq War, whether they held any public office in 2002 or not, will be accused of flip-flopping if they now concede they would not have voted for it with the benefit of hindsight.
Also, media liberals would very much like to get hawkish Republicans on the record saying the Iraq War was a complete blunder, to dispirit the Republican Party’s supporters in the military community. It would complete the process of absolving the lunatic Left of responsibility for their excesses during the latter Bush years.
Rubio was correct in that Fox News interview to challenge sanguine assumptions about the pastoral scenery on the road not taken. We cannot say what the murderous Saddam Hussein would have done if left in power. The brief for war presented by the Bush Administration covered far more than his drive to obtain nuclear weapons, which was not anywhere near as sated as history revisionists would have us believe. Flagrant defiance of U.N. resolutions, without consequence, was destroying the credibility of an international institution liberals claim to deeply believe in. Iran and other bad actors would have been inspired to even greater defiance… and as the utter debacle of Obama’s “nuclear negotiations” illustrates, the mullahs aren’t exactly model citizens in this timeline.
As for ISIS, there is no reason to feel confident that Saddam would have kept them bottled up in Syria or neutralized them. ISIS could easily have ended up in an alliance with Saddam’s Iraq – the remnants of his Baath party certainly seem to get along with them well.
Supporters of the Iraq war had a theory that establishing a purple-finger beachhead for democracy, after decapitating the Hussein regime, would make the Middle East more stable by giving it a shining example to counter the bloody allure of Islamist fundamentalism. It didn’t work out that way… but was it absolutely, 100 percent foolish for them to try, given the post-9/11 atmosphere? It is not as if Democrats can claim to have learned any lessons about the folly of regime change, since Obama and Clinton did the same thing in Libya – even more unilaterally, and with even more hideous results.
There is a way for a gifted orator like
to explain that he has learned those lessons– that he is not interested in second-guessing the past, or speculating about what he would have done, if he had been in position to cast the vote Hillary Clinton actually did cast. It’s not unreasonable to take stock of mistakes that have been made, and gambles that didn’t pay off, while also understanding positive consequences, and admitting that hindsight really isn’t 20/20. Even those who disagree with the vision Rubio articulates would respect his willingness to stand by everything he has said, acknowledge that it seems at variance with what he now says he would have done in 2002, and explain why it is not 2002 any more. “It wasn’t a mistake, but I wouldn’t have done it” is tricky political ground, but it can be held.
entrapment
noun en·trap·ment \-mənt\
: the act of entrapping someone or something or the condition of being entrapped
: the illegal act of tricking someone into committing a crime so that the person you have tricked can be arrested
 |
Wednesday, May 13, 2015
Democrats BECOMING RICH ....while IN office....Corruption?...RINO's NOT innoncent
http://media.cq.com/50Richest/
McCaul may be, according to his financial disclosure, the
second-richest member of Congress, but he didn’t list a single asset in
his name — not even a bank account worth at least $1,000. Instead,
McCaul’s wealth is entirely connected to his wife, Linda McCaul, the
daughter of Clear Channel Communications founder Lowry Mays.
Exactly how much money McCaul and his wife have is a mystery. Several of the holdings in his wife’s name are in the broad spousal asset category of $1 million or more. On his 2011 disclosure, McCaul listed many of those same assets as being worth at least $50 million — the highest category. In that year, his wealth was estimated to be at least $305 million, and even though his wealth has been calculated closer to $100 million for the past two years, there’s no reason to believe he has any less money now than he did in 2011.
But even if some assets are being dramatically undercounted, McCaul’s wealth is still staggering — as is the number of assets listed in his wife's and children’s names. The McCaul family’s wealth is almost entirely invested in the stock market and in municipal bonds.
The family portfolio shows a wide-range of traditional stocks — AT&T, Wal-Mart, Berkshire Hathaway — as well as investments in a number of government bonds, with a special emphasis on investment projects in Texas.
Even with all the wealth, McCaul does maintain a mortgage debt of between $500,001 and $1,000,000 on his personal residence in Austin, Texas. It happens to be the only thing on his financial disclosure to which he is formally connected; it’s a joint liability with his wife.
Roll Call Member profile »
One year after gaining notice as the most well-off congressional
candidate elected in 2012, Delaney’s minimum net worth soared by almost
64 percent. He's now the wealthiest Democrat in Congress — and the
third-richest overall.
The self-made financier is the only current member who has been a chief executive of a publicly-traded company, and he’s held that title at two businesses he created. The son of a unionized electrical worker, Delaney founded HealthCare Financial Partners as a young lawyer in 1993, which specialized in lending money to smaller medical firms. He sold his controlling interest six years later for more than half a billion dollars and used the profits to start CapitalSource of Chevy Chase, Md., which loans to small and midsize businesses that can’t get credit at good rates from bigger banks.
Although he stepped away from the bank’s day-to-day leadership before taking office, CapitalSource continues to be the principal font of Delaney’s riches. His stake in the firm, which topped $25 million the year he was elected, grew to exceed $50 million during his freshman year in the House.
A member of the Financial Services Committee, Delaney has a stake of between $5 million and $25 million in another suburban Maryland financial services firm he helped found: Alliance Partners, which specializes in helping small banks pool resources to invest in big projects. He also has investments of comparable significance in Congressional Bancshares Inc. of Bethesda, Md.; a hedge fund in San Francisco; an equity fund in New York and a money market account at Goldman Sachs. (The values of the last two assets jumped from the minimum $1 million range a year earlier.) He has smaller stakes in 16 other investment partnerships.
Delaney has more than $5 million on deposit with Wells Fargo and lesser balances at six other banks. A family trust owns stock in three dozen companies, from Airgas to Williams Sonoma. He and the trust have also purchased more than 40 different municipal bonds, about a third of them issued in Maryland.
Last year, Delaney got an influx of cash by exercising $4.7 million in CapitalSource stock options, and his wife, April, sold more than $2.5 million of her shares. The money that would have more than paid for the Capitol Hill townhouse the couple recently bought (without a mortgage). The Delaneys live in Potomac, Md., a half-hour drive from the Capitol but just outside the boundaries of the sprawling district where he spent $2.3 million of his own money to get elected two years ago.
The congressman’s only major liabilities, valued between $1 million and $5 million, are his mortgage on that house and the investment capital he borrowed from a newly formed family trust 16 years ago.
Roll Call Member profile »
Rockefeller, an heir of the oil tycoon John D. Rockefeller, makes
Roll Call’s 50 richest list in his last year in Congress, this year
climbing up one spot with a minimum net worth of $108 million. That's an
increase of $25 million from last year. The leap is caused by one of
his blind trusts increasing in value from the $25 million to the $50
million range.
Rockefeller’s wealth is concentrated in three separate blind trusts: the trusts at JPMorgan and Wells Fargo are each worth at least $50 million and the third, at United National Bank in Charleston, W.Va., is worth at least $5 million. Because the highest category for disclosure is $50 million or more, Rockefeller’s assets from the JPMorgan and Wells Fargo trusts could be much higher than the minimum amount he was required to disclose. His total assets are worth at least $113 million, up from at least $89 million in 2013.
Recent transactions include the sale of property in D.C.'s Cleveland Park neighborhood by his spouse, Sharon Rockefeller. The five bedroom, 3.5 bath home was not their primary residence, and the disclosure listed a value of at least $1 million. Sharon Rockefeller also owns more than $1 million in PepsiCo corporate securities stock, and she received compensation of more than $1,000 for serving on PepsiCo’s board.
Rockefeller listed only two liabilities on his disclosure form. The first is a 1998 demand loan from United National Bank in Charleston, W.Va., worth at least $5 million. The second is a 2013 mortgage worth at least $500,000 in Sharon Rockefeller’s name. The mortgage for a New York City apartment as detailed on previous years' forms. It was previously worth at least $1 million, indicating the Rockefellers have paid down part of it.
Roll Call Member profile »
Virginia’s senior senator, who recently became the junior
Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, made an enormous fortune as a
venture capitalist before he turned 40, which is about when he began
spending some of his millions to launch his rapid rise in Virginia
politics.
After taking a job out of law school as a fundraiser for the Democratic National Committee, Warner started ventures in energy and real estate, but really hit it big in telecommunications. He convinced some investors to help him purchase cellular telephone licenses the government was selling for a relative song in the early 1980s and then staked a big and early claim in Nextel, which soon blossomed into one of the biggest wireless service providers. It was swallowed by Sprint Corp. a decade ago, by which point Warner had been state party chairman, staged one closer-than-expected bid for the Senate, had been elected governor and was being touted as a prime presidential prospect. Instead, he cruised into the Senate six years ago on a “radical centrist” platform and is the clear but not quite prohibitive favorite to win his second term this fall.
After big gains in his personal fortune the previous year, Warner’s net worth stayed flat in 2013. His minimum net worth decreased by $1 million since last year — a miniscule fraction of the $95.1 million total. Warner has no liabilities, and his assets remain largely tied up in blind trusts for the benefit of his family — portfolios over which he has no control and minimal awareness of the assets or transactions. The MRW Blind Trust is for the senator’s benefit. The LDC Blind Trust is for the benefit of his wife, Lisa Collis. Their children also have several hundred thousand dollars worth of assets in their trusts.
The senator’s most valuable investments are worth more than $5 million each. All five are part of his blind trust.
Warner sits on the board of directors of The Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. He is also on the board of the Collis Warner Foundation, Inc., the family's charitable arm run by his wife. He reports no earned income from either position.
Roll Call Member profile »
The youngest lawmaker among the ten wealthiest members of
Congress, Polis has a diverse and unusual portfolio stocked with
emerging growth and startup investments.
The Colorado Democrat's assets include stakes of at least $1 million in the world’s only aquaculture venture capital firm, Aquacopia; the Colorado Internet startup Confluence Commons Inc. (to which he also extended a line of credit worth at least $5 million) and the AIP Japan Fund V, which invests in senior housing in that country. Polis also has a blind trust worth at least $25 million that he set up after being elected to Congress. It delivered more than $1 million of income last year.
Diverse real estate investments in Colorado and Japan yielded at least $480,000 in additional income. And Polis benefited from the run-up in the value of stock in the ride-share company Uber Inc., with a stake now worth at least $500,000.
Polis reported more than $6.5 million in liabilities, including a Merrill Lynch line of credit worth at least $5 million.
Roll Call Member profile »
Blumenthal may have been the biggest loser year-to-year in
Congress, with a minimum net worth that fell more than $20 million and
dropped him a few places on the 50 Richest list. However, the
Connecticut Democrat filed an amendment last October to his 2012
disclosure form concerning the trust of his wife, Cynthia, the daughter
of New York real estate magnate Peter Malkin. The adjustment means 2013
may not have brought nearly as much hardship to the couple as it seems.
Blumenthal's 2013 filing is speckled with private equity and hedge fund holdings. There's also a real estate company in Sao Paulo, Brazil, multiple properties in midtown Manhattan and entities that leased and operated the Empire State Building. Blumenthal additionally lists at least $600,000 worth of gold held at JPMorgan.
The senator receives an annual pension for his 20 years of service as Connecticut’s attorney general before being elected in 2010, and he reported a single mortgage of $500,001 to $1 million as a liability.
Roll Call Member profile »
The freshman Democrat from San Diego remains among the dozen
richest members for a second straight year. He reported minimum net
worth of $45 million at the end of his first year in the House, an
increase of less than 1 percent since his year as a candidate.
That’s thanks in part to the investments he made with the millions he earned as an environmental attorney in the 1990s representing businesses and government agencies in their regulatory disputes. But it’s also because his wife, Lynn Gorguze, has been successful at the helm of Cameron Holdings, a private equity firm focused on manufacturing enterprises established by her father, former Emerson Electric executive Vincent Gorguze. She holds at least $14 million in assets, mainly investments in mutual funds and manufacturing companies.
Peters, who’s in a tossup race for a second term in one of California’s most politically competitive districts, has so far donated about $72,000 to his campaign. He invested almost $3 million to oust GOP incumbent Brian Bilbray in 2012, and Peters clearly has the resources to spend that much and more this fall. He continues to invest heavily in municipal bonds, with $12.5 million in paper issued all across his home state, along with notes issued by local governments in nine other states and Puerto Rico.
The congressman also reported $21,000 in pension payments from the City of San Diego, where he was a councilman for eight years and a port commissioner for four years. He donated the retirement nest egg to the city’s public library.
Roll Call Member profile »
Not much has changed for Feinstein and her husband, private
equity magnate Richard Blum, except that the form published for 2013 did
not show the $2 million in liabilities present a year ago.
Feinstein's a classic case of one of the biggest faults in the reporting requirements: assets in Blum's name may be reported in a broad category of more than $1 million, so the calculated minimum net worth may be a significant understatement.
Blum's assets include holdings in Current Media, the company headed by former Vice President Al Gore that was sold to Al Jazeera. He has significant holdings through Blum Capital Partners in an array of businesses, including the Carlton Hotel chain and OZ Fitness.
Roll Call Member profile »
DelBene saw her wealth increase substantially over the past year
as the price of stock in Microsoft, where she and her husband both
worked as executives, rose and they sold it off.
The Washington Democrat reported a minimum of $37.9 million in assets in 2014. That's $14 million more than last year, when the freshman lawmaker first landed on the list. She is the second wealthiest woman in Congress and is tops among first-term, female lawmakers.
She and her husband, Kurt, who left Microsoft last year and now oversees the federal government’s online health care enrollment website, healthcare.gov, made at least $2.5 million last year by selling off their remaining stock in the technology giant. Not surprisingly, Kurt DelBene returned his federal salary to the U.S. Treasury.
The largest new asset the couple listed is their main residence worth at least $5 million in Medina, Wash., a tony enclave just outside of Seattle whose most famous resident is Microsoft founder Bill Gates. They do not hold a mortgage on the property.
Most of their other assets are spread across a variety of investment accounts, including two funds worth at least $5 million apiece. They also have several million dollars invested in both university and municipal bonds.
DelBene lists no liabilities.
Roll Call Member profile »
After a three-year decline, Buchanan’s minimum net worth
increased by roughly $6 million in 2013. The sudden change of course is
due to fewer liabilities for the Florida Republican in the past year,
which brought his minimum net worth up to $37.15 million.
In a year, Buchanan paid off a significant portion of the mortgage on his purchase of Lear Jet, Aircraft Holding & Leasing, LLC., decreasing the liability from $5 million to $1 million. He also closed a million-dollar line of credit at Bank of America used for one of his car dealerships, bringing down his liability total and subsequently increasing his minimum net worth.
Buchanan saw some other financial changes in 2013. He sold $2 million of hedge fund investments and a $1 million property in Florida. Buchanan also saw an investment in a Michigan apartment building increase in value from at least $1 million in 2012 to at least $5 million in 2013.
Despite some sizable transactions, the total value of the his assets remains relatively unchanged compared with 2012. Buchanan’s assets are still divided between investments and real estate holdings.
Buchanan’s financial disclosure report revealed he is a partner in or managing member of 35 organizations, which are mainly real estate entities. Buchanan remains a managing member of his automotive group, which helped build his fortune.
Roll Call Member profile »
Pingree’s fortune may have leveled out in 2013, but her personal
clout as a job creator amid the tight-knit island community of North
Haven, Maine, continues to grow.
Pingree and her husband, investment guru Donald Sussman, saw little change in their financial picture — with nearly $34.5 million minimum net worth, almost $36.5 million in combined assets and $2 million of debt — over the past 12 months. Sussman maintains a steady revenue stream that includes seven-figure paydays from no less than a half-dozen prominent hedge funds, real estate ventures and various international organizations, while also juggling less rewarding enterprises (including Maine’s Own Organic Milk, Maine Today Media holdings and a pair of struggling property development projects).
Pingree, meanwhile, has consolidated the power base she established a decade ago with the opening of Nebo Lodge — which has since garnered nationwide attention from prestigious food and travel outlets — by expanding her hospitality empire to include seasonal “barn dinners” at her nearby home, Turner Farm. Her youngest daughter, Cecily Pingree, bolstered the family-run dining portfolio by launching a companion eatery, Calderwood Hall Pizza earlier this summer.
Should any of her projects need a shot in the arm, Pingree can tap into the more than $1 million she has parked in a personal account with JPMorgan Chase & Co. Then again, she doesn’t appear to spend her cash all willy-nilly.
Pingree allowed the Embassy of Turkey to pick up the tab for a 5-day trip to Istanbul she took last spring.
Roll Call Member profile »
Miller cemented his standing as the one of the biggest real
estate tycoons in Congress during the past year. Because the minimum
value of his expansive and expanding property portfolio nearly doubled,
to more than $33 million, he surged up several places on the 50 Richest
roster.
This will be the Californian’s final appearance on the list of wealthiest members. He’s leaving this fall after eight terms, where he’s risen to be a senior Republican on both the Financial Services and Transportation committees, having concluded that his recently redrawn House district in San Bernardino County’s Inland Empire was too reliably Democratic for him to survive.
Miller got into the business of developing commercial and residential real estate after dropping out of community college in 1970, and he’d made enough of a fortune by 1998 that he was able to finance his bid to oust an ethically tarnished GOP incumbent in the primary. He’s been among the most well-off members ever since.
His first partnership, with a building contractor to bid on federal contracts to improve housing for the poor, led Miller to start building single-family homes and, later, developing planned communities. His two most ambitious recent ventures — in which his stakes grew last year to between $5 million and $25 million (up from the $1 million to $5 million range) — are both subdivisions at the eastern edge of the Cascade Mountains in Bend, Ore. Miller also owns rental houses, residential lots, commercial tracts and stakes in other developments in and adjacent to that picturesque boomtown. That portfolio was worth at least $11 million, but potentially as much as $51 million, and that was after selling 19 houses and twice as many buildable lots in 2013.
Bend is 850 miles from the congressman’s home town of Rancho Cucamonga, where his most prominent holdings are a 385-acre ranch, ripe for development and worth between $4 million and $20 million, and a handful of industrial lots worth $1 million to $5 million. He’s also holding onto a pair of one-acre residential lots (worth at least $1 million each) in the Los Angeles suburb of Diamond Bar.
The congressman also holds a handful of relatively small positions in investment funds. His only liability is a line of credit, on which he owes a minimum of $500,000, taken out last year.
Roll Call Member profile »
Pelosi's minimum net worth in 2013 was slightly more than $29 million, a few million more than what she reported in 2012.
The boost in the House minority leader's personal finances is, in part, attributable to stock investments associated with her husband that grew significantly over the course of a year. Paul Pelosi's investment in Comcast, for instance, doubled between 2012 and 2013, from at least $250,000 to at least $500,000. Meanwhile, his stake in a real estate development project in Sacramento, Calif., skyrocketed from at least $1 million to at least $5 million.
Paul Pelosi also sold off a commercial property he owned in San Anselmo, Calif., which he had a mortgage of at least $1 million on in 2012.
The couple's joint investments, which are few, are primarily in California real estate. They include a vineyard worth at least $5 million that generated at least $100,000 in income from grape sales last year.
In 2013, Pelosi maintained her affiliations with a number of boards, institutions and associations, including the U.S. Botanic Garden, the Kennedy Center and the Women & Politics Institute at American University. She also added another non-paid position to the mix, joining the board of the Close Up Foundation, which states its mission as "informing, inspiring, and empowering young people to exercise the rights and accept the responsibilities of citizens in a democracy."
Roll Call Member profile »
Renacci's minimum net worth decreased for a second year in a row, dropping him outside of the top 10.
The Pennsylvania native started out as an accountant in Pittsburgh before settling in Wadsworth, Ohio, to launch his own accounting business and invest in a chain of nursing homes. He later served as mayor of the town before running for Congress in 2010.
He's invested in professional sports teams, including a failed venture into the Arena Football League as part owner and general manager of the now-defunct Columbus Destroyers. However, Renacci continues to hold at least a $100,000 stake in the Lancaster, Calif.-based JetHawks, a minor-league baseball team.
He also owns real estate in several Ohio towns including Canton, Alliance, Louisville and Wadsworth. He purchased a Washington, D.C., property for at least $1 million in June 2013. Renacci's stake (at least $500,000) in Harley Davidson dealerships stayed the same after increasing in 2012. He is still owed a personal loan from his campaign worth at least $250,000.
Renacci reported only one liability, a line of credit worth at least $100,000 that he ended up paying off in full last year.
He once again disclosed the precise value of many assets instead of reporting them in broad ranges. His report of assets, liabilities and transactions runs to 447 pages.
Roll Call Member profile »
The Texas Republican, born John Roger Williams, has raced into
the ranks of the 50 Richest by virtue of his myriad automotive holdings.
The biggest chunk of his nest egg — Williams has a minimum net worth of approximately $28 million, with assets totaling around $31.5 million while carrying around $3.5 million in debt — is the eponymous JRW Corporation & Affiliates (estimated value: at least $25 million). Additional revenue streams in from assorted automobile dealerships, as well as a car-washing venture.
Williams collected another $50,000-plus from his stake in Quintana Energy Partners, an investment fund focusing on fossil fuels. His wife, Patty, kept busy by putting in hours at one of the family’s car dealerships. She also drew a paycheck from PK Flowers Interiors, Inc., a home designer offering services ranging from by-the-hour consultations to full-scale remodeling.
The couple has at least two fashionable places to hang their hats: their million-plus dollar home in Weatherford, Texas, and a $1 million-plus vacation spot just outside the city of Marble Falls, Texas. Williams borrowed more than $250,000 in 2012 to carve out a place for he and his wife at Horseshoe Bay Resort, a tony Texas community that boasts four professionally designed golf courses, a yacht club and dedicated spa.
In addition to the lakeside property, Williams has indulged his collector’s eye by amassing $1 million-plus in “sports memorabilia,” “political and military artifacts” and “historical documents,” as well as traditional art and photographs. He’s also tucked away at least $250,000 in an irrevocable trust for his children.
The guy is also quite the giver — to himself, anyway.
He’s owed upwards of $250,000 from his congressional campaign and one of his corporate holdings. Williams Chrysler Dodge Jeep, meanwhile, is on the hook to him for north of a cool million.
Roll Call Member profile »
Grayson's net worth surged by almost $10 million as he actively
bought and sold exchange traded funds — mutual funds that trade like
stocks and allow investors to bet on short-term market movements. The
Florida lawmaker netted more than $15 million from sales of the
instruments, according to his transactions report. Liabilities were
dominated by a margin account at TD Ameritrade worth at least $5
million.
Grayson founded the Grayson Fund Management Co. after losing his first re-election bid in 2010, a career change that allowed him to dive into asset management. His stake in the firm is worth at least $5 million, according to his financial disclosure report. His portfolio also includes at least $1 million of stock in Collectors Universe, which authenticates coins, sports cards, autographs and stamps; the aviation leasing firm Fly Leasing; and Northern Tier Energy. Other significant holdings are in drugstore chain CVS and Russia’s second-biggest oil company, Lukoil. Grayson also reported more than $1.25 million of options in China Mobile.
Roll Call Member profile »
The New York Republican’s minimum net worth increased slightly
compared to 2012. In 2013, Collins was worth at least $22.5 million due
to investments in emerging companies and real estate.
Before coming to Congress in 2012, Collins was a successful businessman who used his management experience during a term as Erie County executive and his financial disclosure reflects his ties to Western New York.
Collins has significant investments in local companies including $5 million in Volland Electric in Buffalo, N.Y. He also has investments worth at least $5 million dollars in Buffalo's ZeptoMetrix Corporation, which is a biotechnology organization that focuses on infectious diseases and the immune system.
However, geography isn’t Collins’ only link to those particular companies. He worked for both ZeptoMetrix and Volland in the past and his wife, Mary Sue, is listed as receiving income from those two groups. However, Collins did not report his wife’s exact income, since House rules stipulate that for spouses, only the source and type of income must be disclosed.
The biotech investments also expand overseas, most notably to Innate Immunotherapeutics, a biotech company that develops technology that applies to the human immune system in an effort to combat certain cancers and diseases. In 2012, Collins invested in the company’s New Zealand offices. Collins expanded that investment in 2013 to the company’s Australia offices, purchasing $3 million in Innate Immunotherapeutics stock.
Collins’ investment in the biotech industry is well suited for his congressional subcommittee assignments. He is a member of the Agriculture Subcommittee on Horticulture, Research, Biotechnology and Foreign Agriculture. He also chairs the Small Business Subcommittee on Health and Technology.
For the second year in a row, Collins reported no liabilities.
Roll Call Member profile »
Among the longest-serving of the relatively few remaining House
Republican moderates, Frelinghuysen saw his minimum net worth slip
significantly in the past year, even as his legislative influence
surged.
Nine years ago, he was pegged the 11th richest member, but his wealth relative to his colleagues started slipping soon after. After coming in at 16 on 2012's list and landing at 18 last year, he has dropped another place, in part because the value floor for his expansive stock and real estate portfolio declined 17 percent to $17.3 million from $20.9 million.
A more public change for him came last November, when he was named chairman of the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee after the death of Florida Rep. C.W. Bill Young. The subcommittee takes the lead for the House in apportioning to the military slightly more of federal discretionary spending every year.
Frelinghuysen, along with half a dozen family trusts, maintains positions in more than 100 health care, technology, energy, financial services and consumer products companies. None is among the biggest defense contractors, but he owns between $50,000 and $100,000 worth of General Electric, which is providing more than $2 billion in communications systems to the Pentagon this year, and between $100,000 and $250,000 of Federal Express, which does at least $1 billion in annual deliveries for the military. He holds stock in at least a dozen other businesses that sell goods and services to the Defense Department and other government agencies.
About a third of his wealth, at least $6 million, is in the Proctor & Gamble stock he’s inherited. His mother, born Beatrice Sterling Procter, was a descendent of one of the personal care conglomerate’s founders.
Frelinghuysen also has more than $1 million invested in IBM and with the Daily Income Fund, a money market. He’s got at least that much in his checking account at a bank that caters to the high-net-worth residents in New Jersey’s horse country. And he’s got land worth about $600,000 at the outer edge of the New York suburbs and in the Berkshire Mountains of Massachusetts. Frelinghuysen reported no liabilities.
The congressman’s investments will gain additional scrutiny if, as expected, he becomes chairman of the Appropriations Committee in 2017. Kentucky Republican Harold Rogers will have reached his three-term limit then. Next year, Frelinghuysen will be second in majority party seniority and he remains safely ensconced in a district that covers many of the wealthiest and best-educated communities in the state, where his family has been a political force since the Revolution. When he arrived in the House in 1995, he became the sixth Frelinghuysen in Congress.
Roll Call Member profile »
Black showed a slightly lower minimum net worth in 2013 than she did the year before — a roughly $3.7 million gap.
Part of the shortfall is attributable to a change in value of certain stock investments owned by Black's husband. The couple jointly listed a higher debt in 2013 than they did in 2012 — at least $11 million in mortgages on properties they own throughout Nashville, as compared to the $9.5 million minimum they listed the year before. Their initial rise in the wealth ranks since Black was elected to Congress in 2010 was also precipitated by the sale of her husband's forensic science company, Aegis Sciences Corp., to a New York private equity firm in late 2010.
But the second-term lawmaker still cleared the list's top 20 wealthiest lawmakers, thanks in part to continued, substantial investments in Tennessee real estate. All told, Black and her spouse jointly own least $19 million worth of properties throughout Nashville, plus a home in Panama City, Fla., with a minimum value of $250,000.
Black's husband, David, also lists numerous and significant stocks connected to Aegis, which began as a "sports anti-doping laboratory at Vanderbilt University" that the couple founded and where he still serves as president and chief executive officer.
Roll Call Member profile »
The 33-year scion of the Kennedy political fortune also has inherited millions of dollars from his famed ancestors.
Kennedy, the son of former Rep. Joseph P. Kennedy II and grandson of Robert F. Kennedy, is worth nearly $20 million, most of it held in a series family trusts. He’s currently the only Kennedy in Congress, winning election in 2012 after working as a county prosecutor.
The trust holdings cover a wide-range of stocks spread across many sectors, among them Exxon, General Electric, Disney, McDonald's, Google and Coca Cola. His disclosure lists a few dozen stock market transactions over the past year, but none valued at more than $50,000.
Kennedy, who debuted on the list as the 23rd richest lawmaker last year, moved up a spot this year as his wealth grew by more than $3.5 million as the stock market continued to rise.
His largest liabilities are mortgages he holds with his wife, Lauren Anne Birchfield, in Massachusetts and Washington, D.C., on personal residences. The couple owes at least $500,000 on the mortgage for their property in the District, while the mortgage on their Bay State home is about half that.
Like last year, Kennedy lists about $80,000 in student loans owed by his wife. Birchfield, who he met in law school at Harvard, works for the National Partnership for Women and Families but does not list a salary. She also received a $31,000 consulting fee from Boston Medical Center.
Roll Call Member profile »
Risch, the junior senator from Idaho, saw little change in his
wealth over the past year as his vast ranch and farm land holdings in
Idaho held their value.
His net worth increased about $100,000 to a minimum of $19.2 million, but he dropped a few slots on the list as members with stock-driven investments saw their portfolios grow faster.
Risch’s largest holdings are ranch and farm lands in southwest Idaho, including three parcels worth at least $5 million apiece. He collects at least $5,000 annually on each of the properties in royalty and rent payments.
Risch sits on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, where he has sought to look out for the interest of Western landowners. In particular, Risch opposes the federal reintroduction and protection of gray wolves in the West that have killed calves on some of his land.
Additionally, Risch owns several commercial properties and is involved with several real estate partnerships, including an office building in Boise that he collected at least $5,000 in rent on last year.
Like past years, Risch also reports more than $250,000 in outstanding notes from his 2002 GOP primary campaign for lieutenant governor, which he won.
Risch also owns a condominium in Washington, D.C., worth at least $250,000.
Roll Call Member profile »
Corker saw his minimum net worth jump $1.3 million over the
previous year to at least $18 million. He reported eight transactions of
more than $1 million each, including five purchases and three sales. Of
the five purchases, one was for a transfer of at least $5 million to a
Raymond James account.
The lion’s share of Corker’s wealth comes from several real estate investments, including The Volunteer Building in Chattanooga, Tenn., which was valued at a least $5 million. Corker owned a construction company, then became a real estate developer before ultimately being elected mayor of Chattanooga. He was later courted to run for the Senate by former Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn.
Corker also reported at least a $5 million interest in Pointer (QP) LP, a private investment partnership also based in Chattanooga. He also disclosed a $1 million investment in Gerber Taylor Partners and $1 million in Gerber Taylor Global Hedge L.P., both investment funds based in Memphis.
Corker reported no liabilities. Last year he listed a pair of mortgages connected to his Corker Properties Ltd. that were worth at least $1 million apiece and date to 1998.
Roll Call Member profile »
McCaskill's net worth rose $3.5 million from last year to a minimum of $18.37 million.
Most of her wealth stems from her husband, Joseph Shepard. The St. Louis businessman primarily made his fortune developing affordable housing and nursing homes around the nation.
Shepard reported three transactions of more than $1 million, including a sale related to the New Zealand-based Fisher Funds. The other two transactions were purchases. McCaskill also reported receiving $70,000 from Simon & Schuster for a yet to be titled book.
Shepard’s wealth became a topic of interest during McCaskill's last campaign, particularly over government subsidies he received in connection with his development business.
Shepard’s assets include a minimum of $1 million each in Missouri and Georgia House Tax Credit Funds. He also has at least $1 million each invested in The Terrace Apartments and The Lockwood Group, a development firm.
Shepard is also listed as holding at least $1 million worth of Berkshire Hathaway Class A shares, which sell for just over $200,000 each. He also holds at least $15,001 of the Class B shares. Berkshire Hathaway is a U.S.-based conglomerate owned by billionaire investor Warren Buffett. Buffett’s concern that his secretary paid a higher tax rate than he did became a principle — known as the Buffett Rule — pushed by Democrats that everyone should pay their "fair share" in taxes.
Roll Call Member profile »
Petri’s assets may be similar year-to-year, but 2013 was very
good to the retiring Wisconsin Republican. His wealth grew by more than
50 percent, according to his latest financial disclosure.
Of course, much of that growth may be attributable to how his assets are counted on his financial disclosure, but Petri has made some savvy, if not controversial, investments.
Petri is currently the subject of an Ethics Committee investigation due to his ownership of more than $500,000 in the Oshkosh Corp. The defense contractor, which resides in Petri’s district, has seen sharp stock gains thanks in part to Pentagon contracts that Petri advocated for.
Petri’s financial disclosure, which is in many places almost illegible, also lists more than $5 million in stock in U.S. Bank and Walgreens.
Petri’s liabilities include a mortgage of more than $100,000 and a loan from Merrill Lynch of more than $500,000, which is down from $1 million from last year.
Roll Call Member profile »
Returning to the 50 Richest list is Rep. Richard Hanna of New
York, whose minimum net worth increased slightly to $15.3 million. The
New York congressman is once again boasting a healthy portfolio
featuring stock holdings in companies such as PepsiCo, Chevron and
Pfizer.
Hanna holds at least $250,000 in PepsiCo and a minimum of $500,000 in Chevron. His Fidelity money market account is worth a minimum of $500,000, a decrease from last year. His real estate assets include Gabriel Group LLC., in Utica, N.Y.
Held jointly with his wife, Hanna has a minimum of $20,000 in liabilities owed to Chase and American Express.
Roll Call Member profile »
Arizona’s senior senator, the 2008 Republican nominee for
president and among the pivotal legislative forces in Congress ever
since, has roared back onto the 50 Richest list after two years off the
roster.
The McCain fortune is almost entirely thanks to the senator’s wife, Cindy. For the past two decades, she has been the controlling stockholder in Hensley & Co., which her father, Jim, started in a quite sleepy Arizona in the 1950s but which has grown to become the largest beverage distributor in the burgeoning state as well as the third-largest Anheuser-Busch distributor in the country.
The senator’s minimum net worth more than doubled in the past year, to $15.1 million, because of significant gains in the McCain investments and big time reductions in the couple’s debts.
Their assets increased more than 35 percent because of a newly established portfolio of Charles Schwab accounts, held in Cindy McCain’s name, worth at least $3.4 million, along with four notes receivable from various McCain family trusts worth at least $3.25 million. On the other side of the ledger, Cindy McCain repaid more than $3.4 million in virtually interest-free promissory notes owed to the family business. That left as the couple’s only liabilities balances totaling more than $145,000 on a quartet of her credit cards.
That improved picture marked a big financial rebound for McCain, who had seen his millions shrink steadily since he last ran for president. His net worth was at least $20 million just six years ago, when he was the 13th wealthiest member of Congress.
His family money became an issue that year, when he conceded he couldn’t recall how many houses he owned. Democrats, led by their nominee Barack Obama, took delight in labeling that memory lapse as evidence McCain was way out of touch with the economic concerns of everyday Americans. The senator’s most recent disclosures makes that tally more clear. The couple still owns at least five residences: Their voting home in Phoenix, three properties in luxurious neighborhoods in southern California and the family’s picturesque getaway between Sedona and Cottonwood, Ariz., the ranch where McCain interviewed then-Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska to be his running mate.
Beyond his Senate salary and some royalties for his books, the only income McCain added to the 2013 ledger was his $71,000 pension from his quarter-century in the Navy.
Roll Call Member profile »
Hoeven, a successful bank president before entering politics,
continues to be a savvy investor as he increased his net worth by almost
a million dollars over the past year to $15.1 million.
The North Dakotan’s two largest holdings are the same as in 2013: at least $5 million in stock of Westbrand Inc. Bank Holding Co., based in Minot, N.D., that produced at least $100,000 in dividends, and at least $5 million in the Minnesota medical equipment company Northwest Respiratory Services LLC, which produced $2.3 million in income.
Hoeven is an active trader and holds an array of blue-chip stocks, including at least $100,000 in McDonald's, Microsoft, Intel, Johnson and Johnson, General Mills and Coca-Cola stock. He has a financial interest in high-end fashion with at least $100,000 in Coach stock and $50,000 in Ralph Lauren stock. And closer to his North Dakota roots, the Senate Agriculture Committee member owns at least $100,000 in John Deere stock.
His largest investment over the past year was $500,000 in Mainstream Investors LLC, a North Dakota company created in 2012 to provide capital for the state’s exploding oil and national gas production operations. He also made at least $100,000 when Berkshire Hathaway acquired HJ Heinz and brought out its stockholders.
Hoeven remains a director of the First Western Bank in Minot where he began his banking career in the 1980s. He’s due to receive a monthly pension of $837.74 from the bank when he retires and still maintains a checking account there with at least a million dollars in it.
Roll Call Member profile »
The former automotive executive joined the ranks of wealthiest
members upon winning a June special election for the seat vacated by
Republican Trey Radel. Clawson's assets include at least $865,000 worth
of real estate in Florida, Michigan, Illinois and the Caribbean and a
stake in Italy's AS Roma soccer club worth at least $250,000.
Other holdings include at least $500,000 in Clawson Investments LLC, which invests in Endocyte Inc., a biotech company, and at least $500,000 in the Widsomtree Japan Hedge Equity Fund, which has positions in companies including Toyota Motor Corp. and Mitsubishi Financial Group. The lawmaker's portfolio also includes at least $500,000 in New York city and state bonds. Clawson's liabilities include a margin account with Deutsche Bank worth at least $250,000.
Roll Call Member profile »
The first-term Wisconsin Republican's net worth climbed $1
million in 2013, as a property he and his wife own in Oshkosh, Wis.,
jumped a reporting category in value, to at least $5 million. It threw
off $100,000 to $1 million in rent.
Johnson's single biggest asset is a money market account at Charles Schwab worth between $5 million and $25 million. He maintains a $1 million to $5 million stake in Pacur Inc., a plastics manufacturer he launched with his brother-in-law that's involved in medical device packaging and high-tech printing applications.
Johnson also has a 9.9 percent ownership stake worth between $250,000 and $500,000 in DPLenticular Ltd., a 3D printing business based in Ireland.
Roll Call Member profile »
The second-most-senior House Republican has represented the
Milwaukee suburbs since 1979, and he’s been among the wealthier members
Congress ever since. That’s because he’s the heir to the Kimberly-Clark
paper and consumer goods fortune. A great-grandfather rose to chair the
company board after inventing its signature feminine hygiene product,
Kotex, almost a century ago.
Sensenbrenner, who’s spent the maximum permissible six years in the top GOP seat on both the Judiciary and Science committees, is among the relatively few members who disclose more about their finances than the Hill’s rules require. He provides hundreds of pages of down-to-the-penny detail about his diversified portfolio of securities and their performances as part of 14 different family trusts. The records show the worth of his investments grew by 18 percent, or $2 million, in the past year, to just above $13 million. (Had he stuck with the ranges of value on the House forms, his minimum net worth would have looked to be a little more than half as much and he might not appear on the 50 Richest roster.)
Two trusts, created to benefit Sensenbrenner’s now-adult sons, hold a combined $2.3 million in stock issued by Kimberly-Clark and a pair of its spinoffs. The other trusts have no holdings in the family business. Instead, the congressman’s biggest stakes, worth $500,001 to $1 million, are shares in AbbVie, Exxon Mobil, Pfizer and Philip Morris.
Sensenbrenner supplemented his congressional salary with $45,000 in fees as a trustee of the family holdings and a $31,000 pension from his decade in the Wisconsin legislature. He also reported spending three recess weeks overseas (in Seoul, Tel Aviv and Munich) on educational trips paid for by nonprofits seeking to promote international good will.
Roll Call Member profile »
The Senate minority leader has now been among the 50 wealthiest
lawmakers for six consecutive years, since he won re-election to a fifth
term. And in 2013, he saw his minimum net worth jump almost 30 percent,
to a hair less than $12 million.
The Kentucky Republican’s reportable assets nearly tripled in 2008 thanks to a $5 million gift that he and his wife, former Labor Secretary Elaine L. Chao, received from her father, James, soon after the death of her mother. (After emigrating in the 1960s, the senator’s father-in-law founded a successful international trading business, now called the Foremost Group, specializing in importing Chinese-made goods to the United States.) The money has been invested ever since in a tax-exempt money market fund that remains the McConnells’ most significant asset by far.
The fact that McConnell has become so much better-off during his three decades in Congress has recently become an issue in his highly competitive re-election campaign. His Democratic challenger, Kentucky Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes, aired a television ad in August alleging the incumbent had overstayed his welcome in the Senate by becoming “a multimillionaire in public office” while opposing minimum wage increases, fighting unemployment insurance extensions and supporting “tax breaks that send Kentucky jobs overseas.”
McConnell has not listed any liabilities for several years, and the bulk of the most recent increase in the value of his assets is attributable to investment gains by Chao. One of her mixed investment funds increased in value by at least $500,000, while the disclosure forms for the first time mentioned a pension investment fund in which she’s invested at least $500,000. Chao also received deferred compensation of at least $250,000 from Protective Life Corp., a life insurance business where she was on the board of directors.
Roll Call Member profile »
Harkin’s net worth is virtually unchanged from last year, ticking down $30,000 to a minimum of $11.85 million.
Harkin himself owns very few assets — he has a bank account with Morgan Stanley worth between $1,001 and $15,001 and another in LPL Financial whose worth is in the same range. He also has three investments worth between $1,001 and $15,001.
Most of the assets belong to Harkin's wife, Ruth. The two most valuable assets are an investment in ConocoPhillips, and another in United Technology Corp., both owned by Ruth Harkin, each totaling at least $1 million. The Harkins made at least $100,000 in dividends on the ConocoPhillips investment, and at least $100,000 from an investment in Phillips 66.
Ruth Harkin was on the board of directors ConocoPhillips until last May. She previously served as senior vice president for international affairs and government relations for United Technologies and reported receiving a pension of at least $1,000 from the company this year.
She also earned at least $1,000 from Ireland’s National Toll Road as compensation for board membership, but does not currently hold any stock in the company.
Roll Call Member profile »
A business consultant who also managed his own life insurance
agency, Schneider saw his portfolio of investment partnerships and
brokerage accounts swell in 2013. His largest stock holdings were stakes
worth $100,001 to $250,000 in companies including Google, Facebook,
Union Pacific, Exxon Mobil and Boeing.
Wealth of Congress
Each year since 1990, CQ Roll Call has reviewed the
financial disclosures of
all 541 senators, representatives and delegates to determine the 50 richest members of Congress. This year's report, derived from forms covering the calendar year 2013, shows it took a net worth of $7.47 million to crack the exclusive club. For the first time, we went a step further by publishing a ranking of every single lawmaker by their minimum net worth. That full list with breakdowns of members' assets and liabilities is found below.
all 541 senators, representatives and delegates to determine the 50 richest members of Congress. This year's report, derived from forms covering the calendar year 2013, shows it took a net worth of $7.47 million to crack the exclusive club. For the first time, we went a step further by publishing a ranking of every single lawmaker by their minimum net worth. That full list with breakdowns of members' assets and liabilities is found below.
Assets by type
| Investments | $401.10M |
| Real estate | $31.10M |
| Trusts | $0.00M |
| Bank accounts | $0.05M |
2.Rep. Michael McCaul
R-Texas
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #2 | $117.54M | $118.04M | $0.50M |
| Previous year | #2 | $114.10M | $114.60M | $0.50M |
| Change | 0 | 3.02% | 3.01% | 0.00% |
Exactly how much money McCaul and his wife have is a mystery. Several of the holdings in his wife’s name are in the broad spousal asset category of $1 million or more. On his 2011 disclosure, McCaul listed many of those same assets as being worth at least $50 million — the highest category. In that year, his wealth was estimated to be at least $305 million, and even though his wealth has been calculated closer to $100 million for the past two years, there’s no reason to believe he has any less money now than he did in 2011.
But even if some assets are being dramatically undercounted, McCaul’s wealth is still staggering — as is the number of assets listed in his wife's and children’s names. The McCaul family’s wealth is almost entirely invested in the stock market and in municipal bonds.
The family portfolio shows a wide-range of traditional stocks — AT&T, Wal-Mart, Berkshire Hathaway — as well as investments in a number of government bonds, with a special emphasis on investment projects in Texas.
Even with all the wealth, McCaul does maintain a mortgage debt of between $500,001 and $1,000,000 on his personal residence in Austin, Texas. It happens to be the only thing on his financial disclosure to which he is formally connected; it’s a joint liability with his wife.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $116.89M |
| Real estate | $0.10M |
| Trusts | $1.00M |
| Bank accounts | $0.05M |
3.Rep. John Delaney
D-Md.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #3 | $111.92M | $113.99M | $2.07M |
| Previous year | #6 | $68.35M | $70.61M | $2.27M |
| Change | 3 | 63.76% | 61.43% | -8.83% |
The self-made financier is the only current member who has been a chief executive of a publicly-traded company, and he’s held that title at two businesses he created. The son of a unionized electrical worker, Delaney founded HealthCare Financial Partners as a young lawyer in 1993, which specialized in lending money to smaller medical firms. He sold his controlling interest six years later for more than half a billion dollars and used the profits to start CapitalSource of Chevy Chase, Md., which loans to small and midsize businesses that can’t get credit at good rates from bigger banks.
Although he stepped away from the bank’s day-to-day leadership before taking office, CapitalSource continues to be the principal font of Delaney’s riches. His stake in the firm, which topped $25 million the year he was elected, grew to exceed $50 million during his freshman year in the House.
A member of the Financial Services Committee, Delaney has a stake of between $5 million and $25 million in another suburban Maryland financial services firm he helped found: Alliance Partners, which specializes in helping small banks pool resources to invest in big projects. He also has investments of comparable significance in Congressional Bancshares Inc. of Bethesda, Md.; a hedge fund in San Francisco; an equity fund in New York and a money market account at Goldman Sachs. (The values of the last two assets jumped from the minimum $1 million range a year earlier.) He has smaller stakes in 16 other investment partnerships.
Delaney has more than $5 million on deposit with Wells Fargo and lesser balances at six other banks. A family trust owns stock in three dozen companies, from Airgas to Williams Sonoma. He and the trust have also purchased more than 40 different municipal bonds, about a third of them issued in Maryland.
Last year, Delaney got an influx of cash by exercising $4.7 million in CapitalSource stock options, and his wife, April, sold more than $2.5 million of her shares. The money that would have more than paid for the Capitol Hill townhouse the couple recently bought (without a mortgage). The Delaneys live in Potomac, Md., a half-hour drive from the Capitol but just outside the boundaries of the sprawling district where he spent $2.3 million of his own money to get elected two years ago.
The congressman’s only major liabilities, valued between $1 million and $5 million, are his mortgage on that house and the investment capital he borrowed from a newly formed family trust 16 years ago.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $86.69M |
| Real estate | $1.55M |
| Trusts | $18.96M |
| Bank accounts | $6.78M |
4.Sen. Jay Rockefeller
D-W.Va.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #4 | $108.05M | $113.55M | $5.50M |
| Previous year | #5 | $83.77M | $89.27M | $5.50M |
| Change | 1 | 28.98% | 27.20% | 0.00% |
Rockefeller’s wealth is concentrated in three separate blind trusts: the trusts at JPMorgan and Wells Fargo are each worth at least $50 million and the third, at United National Bank in Charleston, W.Va., is worth at least $5 million. Because the highest category for disclosure is $50 million or more, Rockefeller’s assets from the JPMorgan and Wells Fargo trusts could be much higher than the minimum amount he was required to disclose. His total assets are worth at least $113 million, up from at least $89 million in 2013.
Recent transactions include the sale of property in D.C.'s Cleveland Park neighborhood by his spouse, Sharon Rockefeller. The five bedroom, 3.5 bath home was not their primary residence, and the disclosure listed a value of at least $1 million. Sharon Rockefeller also owns more than $1 million in PepsiCo corporate securities stock, and she received compensation of more than $1,000 for serving on PepsiCo’s board.
Rockefeller listed only two liabilities on his disclosure form. The first is a 1998 demand loan from United National Bank in Charleston, W.Va., worth at least $5 million. The second is a 2013 mortgage worth at least $500,000 in Sharon Rockefeller’s name. The mortgage for a New York City apartment as detailed on previous years' forms. It was previously worth at least $1 million, indicating the Rockefellers have paid down part of it.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $7.93M |
| Real estate | $0.00M |
| Trusts | $105.25M |
| Bank accounts | $0.37M |
5.Sen. Mark Warner
D-Va.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #5 | $95.13M | $95.13M | $0.00M |
| Previous year | #3 | $96.31M | $96.31M | $0.00M |
| Change | -2 | -1.22% | -1.22% | 0.00% |
After taking a job out of law school as a fundraiser for the Democratic National Committee, Warner started ventures in energy and real estate, but really hit it big in telecommunications. He convinced some investors to help him purchase cellular telephone licenses the government was selling for a relative song in the early 1980s and then staked a big and early claim in Nextel, which soon blossomed into one of the biggest wireless service providers. It was swallowed by Sprint Corp. a decade ago, by which point Warner had been state party chairman, staged one closer-than-expected bid for the Senate, had been elected governor and was being touted as a prime presidential prospect. Instead, he cruised into the Senate six years ago on a “radical centrist” platform and is the clear but not quite prohibitive favorite to win his second term this fall.
After big gains in his personal fortune the previous year, Warner’s net worth stayed flat in 2013. His minimum net worth decreased by $1 million since last year — a miniscule fraction of the $95.1 million total. Warner has no liabilities, and his assets remain largely tied up in blind trusts for the benefit of his family — portfolios over which he has no control and minimal awareness of the assets or transactions. The MRW Blind Trust is for the senator’s benefit. The LDC Blind Trust is for the benefit of his wife, Lisa Collis. Their children also have several hundred thousand dollars worth of assets in their trusts.
The senator’s most valuable investments are worth more than $5 million each. All five are part of his blind trust.
Warner sits on the board of directors of The Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. He is also on the board of the Collis Warner Foundation, Inc., the family's charitable arm run by his wife. He reports no earned income from either position.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $4.94M |
| Real estate | $0.00M |
| Trusts | $88.91M |
| Bank accounts | $1.28M |
6.Rep. Jared Polis
D-Colo.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #6 | $73.56M | $80.09M | $6.53M |
| Previous year | #7 | $68.13M | $74.64M | $6.51M |
| Change | 1 | 7.97% | 7.30% | 0.23% |
The Colorado Democrat's assets include stakes of at least $1 million in the world’s only aquaculture venture capital firm, Aquacopia; the Colorado Internet startup Confluence Commons Inc. (to which he also extended a line of credit worth at least $5 million) and the AIP Japan Fund V, which invests in senior housing in that country. Polis also has a blind trust worth at least $25 million that he set up after being elected to Congress. It delivered more than $1 million of income last year.
Diverse real estate investments in Colorado and Japan yielded at least $480,000 in additional income. And Polis benefited from the run-up in the value of stock in the ride-share company Uber Inc., with a stake now worth at least $500,000.
Polis reported more than $6.5 million in liabilities, including a Merrill Lynch line of credit worth at least $5 million.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $31.67M |
| Real estate | $20.80M |
| Trusts | $25.00M |
| Bank accounts | $2.62M |
7.Sen. Richard Blumenthal
D-Conn.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #7 | $62.06M | $62.56M | $0.50M |
| Previous year | #4 | $85.32M | $85.82M | $0.50M |
| Change | -3 | -27.26% | -27.10% | 0.00% |
Blumenthal's 2013 filing is speckled with private equity and hedge fund holdings. There's also a real estate company in Sao Paulo, Brazil, multiple properties in midtown Manhattan and entities that leased and operated the Empire State Building. Blumenthal additionally lists at least $600,000 worth of gold held at JPMorgan.
The senator receives an annual pension for his 20 years of service as Connecticut’s attorney general before being elected in 2010, and he reported a single mortgage of $500,001 to $1 million as a liability.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $28.97M |
| Real estate | $22.91M |
| Trusts | $4.82M |
| Bank accounts | $5.86M |
8.Rep. Scott Peters
D-Calif.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #8 | $45.04M | $45.11M | $0.07M |
| Previous year | #8 | $44.74M | $49.87M | $5.13M |
| Change | 0 | 0.68% | -9.55% | -98.73% |
That’s thanks in part to the investments he made with the millions he earned as an environmental attorney in the 1990s representing businesses and government agencies in their regulatory disputes. But it’s also because his wife, Lynn Gorguze, has been successful at the helm of Cameron Holdings, a private equity firm focused on manufacturing enterprises established by her father, former Emerson Electric executive Vincent Gorguze. She holds at least $14 million in assets, mainly investments in mutual funds and manufacturing companies.
Peters, who’s in a tossup race for a second term in one of California’s most politically competitive districts, has so far donated about $72,000 to his campaign. He invested almost $3 million to oust GOP incumbent Brian Bilbray in 2012, and Peters clearly has the resources to spend that much and more this fall. He continues to invest heavily in municipal bonds, with $12.5 million in paper issued all across his home state, along with notes issued by local governments in nine other states and Puerto Rico.
The congressman also reported $21,000 in pension payments from the City of San Diego, where he was a councilman for eight years and a port commissioner for four years. He donated the retirement nest egg to the city’s public library.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $43.59M |
| Real estate | $0.00M |
| Trusts | $0.00M |
| Bank accounts | $1.52M |
9.Sen. Dianne Feinstein
D-Calif.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #9 | $43.72M | $43.72M | $0.00M |
| Previous year | #9 | $41.67M | $43.67M | $2.00M |
| Change | 0 | 4.91% | 0.11% | -100.00% |
Feinstein's a classic case of one of the biggest faults in the reporting requirements: assets in Blum's name may be reported in a broad category of more than $1 million, so the calculated minimum net worth may be a significant understatement.
Blum's assets include holdings in Current Media, the company headed by former Vice President Al Gore that was sold to Al Jazeera. He has significant holdings through Blum Capital Partners in an array of businesses, including the Carlton Hotel chain and OZ Fitness.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $36.25M |
| Real estate | $1.00M |
| Trusts | $6.35M |
| Bank accounts | $0.12M |
10.Rep. Suzan DelBene
D-Wash.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #10 | $37.89M | $37.89M | $0.00M |
| Previous year | #16 | $23.91M | $23.91M | $0.00M |
| Change | 6 | 58.48% | 58.48% | 0.00% |
The Washington Democrat reported a minimum of $37.9 million in assets in 2014. That's $14 million more than last year, when the freshman lawmaker first landed on the list. She is the second wealthiest woman in Congress and is tops among first-term, female lawmakers.
She and her husband, Kurt, who left Microsoft last year and now oversees the federal government’s online health care enrollment website, healthcare.gov, made at least $2.5 million last year by selling off their remaining stock in the technology giant. Not surprisingly, Kurt DelBene returned his federal salary to the U.S. Treasury.
The largest new asset the couple listed is their main residence worth at least $5 million in Medina, Wash., a tony enclave just outside of Seattle whose most famous resident is Microsoft founder Bill Gates. They do not hold a mortgage on the property.
Most of their other assets are spread across a variety of investment accounts, including two funds worth at least $5 million apiece. They also have several million dollars invested in both university and municipal bonds.
DelBene lists no liabilities.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $27.89M |
| Real estate | $5.00M |
| Trusts | $5.00M |
| Bank accounts | $0.00M |
11.Rep. Vern Buchanan
R-Fla.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #11 | $37.15M | $58.30M | $21.15M |
| Previous year | #12 | $31.65M | $58.60M | $26.95M |
| Change | 1 | 17.39% | -0.51% | -21.52% |
In a year, Buchanan paid off a significant portion of the mortgage on his purchase of Lear Jet, Aircraft Holding & Leasing, LLC., decreasing the liability from $5 million to $1 million. He also closed a million-dollar line of credit at Bank of America used for one of his car dealerships, bringing down his liability total and subsequently increasing his minimum net worth.
Buchanan saw some other financial changes in 2013. He sold $2 million of hedge fund investments and a $1 million property in Florida. Buchanan also saw an investment in a Michigan apartment building increase in value from at least $1 million in 2012 to at least $5 million in 2013.
Despite some sizable transactions, the total value of the his assets remains relatively unchanged compared with 2012. Buchanan’s assets are still divided between investments and real estate holdings.
Buchanan’s financial disclosure report revealed he is a partner in or managing member of 35 organizations, which are mainly real estate entities. Buchanan remains a managing member of his automotive group, which helped build his fortune.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $35.51M |
| Real estate | $22.78M |
| Trusts | $0.00M |
| Bank accounts | $0.02M |
12.Rep. Chellie Pingree
D-Maine
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #12 | $34.47M | $36.47M | $2.00M |
| Previous year | #11 | $34.45M | $36.47M | $2.02M |
| Change | -1 | 0.05% | 0.01% | -0.74% |
Pingree and her husband, investment guru Donald Sussman, saw little change in their financial picture — with nearly $34.5 million minimum net worth, almost $36.5 million in combined assets and $2 million of debt — over the past 12 months. Sussman maintains a steady revenue stream that includes seven-figure paydays from no less than a half-dozen prominent hedge funds, real estate ventures and various international organizations, while also juggling less rewarding enterprises (including Maine’s Own Organic Milk, Maine Today Media holdings and a pair of struggling property development projects).
Pingree, meanwhile, has consolidated the power base she established a decade ago with the opening of Nebo Lodge — which has since garnered nationwide attention from prestigious food and travel outlets — by expanding her hospitality empire to include seasonal “barn dinners” at her nearby home, Turner Farm. Her youngest daughter, Cecily Pingree, bolstered the family-run dining portfolio by launching a companion eatery, Calderwood Hall Pizza earlier this summer.
Should any of her projects need a shot in the arm, Pingree can tap into the more than $1 million she has parked in a personal account with JPMorgan Chase & Co. Then again, she doesn’t appear to spend her cash all willy-nilly.
Pingree allowed the Embassy of Turkey to pick up the tab for a 5-day trip to Istanbul she took last spring.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $28.25M |
| Real estate | $5.00M |
| Trusts | $0.00M |
| Bank accounts | $3.22M |
13.Rep. Gary G. Miller
R-Calif.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #13 | $32.97M | $33.47M | $0.50M |
| Previous year | #20 | $17.81M | $17.81M | $0.00M |
| Change | 7 | 85.09% | 87.90% | 0.00% |
This will be the Californian’s final appearance on the list of wealthiest members. He’s leaving this fall after eight terms, where he’s risen to be a senior Republican on both the Financial Services and Transportation committees, having concluded that his recently redrawn House district in San Bernardino County’s Inland Empire was too reliably Democratic for him to survive.
Miller got into the business of developing commercial and residential real estate after dropping out of community college in 1970, and he’d made enough of a fortune by 1998 that he was able to finance his bid to oust an ethically tarnished GOP incumbent in the primary. He’s been among the most well-off members ever since.
His first partnership, with a building contractor to bid on federal contracts to improve housing for the poor, led Miller to start building single-family homes and, later, developing planned communities. His two most ambitious recent ventures — in which his stakes grew last year to between $5 million and $25 million (up from the $1 million to $5 million range) — are both subdivisions at the eastern edge of the Cascade Mountains in Bend, Ore. Miller also owns rental houses, residential lots, commercial tracts and stakes in other developments in and adjacent to that picturesque boomtown. That portfolio was worth at least $11 million, but potentially as much as $51 million, and that was after selling 19 houses and twice as many buildable lots in 2013.
Bend is 850 miles from the congressman’s home town of Rancho Cucamonga, where his most prominent holdings are a 385-acre ranch, ripe for development and worth between $4 million and $20 million, and a handful of industrial lots worth $1 million to $5 million. He’s also holding onto a pair of one-acre residential lots (worth at least $1 million each) in the Los Angeles suburb of Diamond Bar.
The congressman also holds a handful of relatively small positions in investment funds. His only liability is a line of credit, on which he owes a minimum of $500,000, taken out last year.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $0.72M |
| Real estate | $31.35M |
| Trusts | $0.25M |
| Bank accounts | $1.15M |
14.Rep. Nancy Pelosi
D-Calif.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #14 | $29.01M | $42.36M | $13.35M |
| Previous year | #15 | $24.45M | $38.80M | $14.35M |
| Change | 1 | 18.65% | 9.18% | -6.97% |
The boost in the House minority leader's personal finances is, in part, attributable to stock investments associated with her husband that grew significantly over the course of a year. Paul Pelosi's investment in Comcast, for instance, doubled between 2012 and 2013, from at least $250,000 to at least $500,000. Meanwhile, his stake in a real estate development project in Sacramento, Calif., skyrocketed from at least $1 million to at least $5 million.
Paul Pelosi also sold off a commercial property he owned in San Anselmo, Calif., which he had a mortgage of at least $1 million on in 2012.
The couple's joint investments, which are few, are primarily in California real estate. They include a vineyard worth at least $5 million that generated at least $100,000 in income from grape sales last year.
In 2013, Pelosi maintained her affiliations with a number of boards, institutions and associations, including the U.S. Botanic Garden, the Kennedy Center and the Women & Politics Institute at American University. She also added another non-paid position to the mix, joining the board of the Close Up Foundation, which states its mission as "informing, inspiring, and empowering young people to exercise the rights and accept the responsibilities of citizens in a democracy."
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $32.72M |
| Real estate | $8.60M |
| Trusts | $0.00M |
| Bank accounts | $1.03M |
15.Rep. James B. Renacci
R-Ohio
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #15 | $28.08M | $29.08M | $1.00M |
| Previous year | #10 | $35.90M | $36.90M | $1.00M |
| Change | -5 | -21.77% | -21.18% | 0.00% |
The Pennsylvania native started out as an accountant in Pittsburgh before settling in Wadsworth, Ohio, to launch his own accounting business and invest in a chain of nursing homes. He later served as mayor of the town before running for Congress in 2010.
He's invested in professional sports teams, including a failed venture into the Arena Football League as part owner and general manager of the now-defunct Columbus Destroyers. However, Renacci continues to hold at least a $100,000 stake in the Lancaster, Calif.-based JetHawks, a minor-league baseball team.
He also owns real estate in several Ohio towns including Canton, Alliance, Louisville and Wadsworth. He purchased a Washington, D.C., property for at least $1 million in June 2013. Renacci's stake (at least $500,000) in Harley Davidson dealerships stayed the same after increasing in 2012. He is still owed a personal loan from his campaign worth at least $250,000.
Renacci reported only one liability, a line of credit worth at least $100,000 that he ended up paying off in full last year.
He once again disclosed the precise value of many assets instead of reporting them in broad ranges. His report of assets, liabilities and transactions runs to 447 pages.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $23.70M |
| Real estate | $3.70M |
| Trusts | $0.00M |
| Bank accounts | $1.68M |
16.Rep. Roger Williams
R-Texas
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #16 | $28.01M | $31.52M | $3.51M |
| Previous year | #63 | $5.33M | $7.68M | $2.35M |
| Change | 47 | 425.75% | 310.55% | 49.36% |
The biggest chunk of his nest egg — Williams has a minimum net worth of approximately $28 million, with assets totaling around $31.5 million while carrying around $3.5 million in debt — is the eponymous JRW Corporation & Affiliates (estimated value: at least $25 million). Additional revenue streams in from assorted automobile dealerships, as well as a car-washing venture.
Williams collected another $50,000-plus from his stake in Quintana Energy Partners, an investment fund focusing on fossil fuels. His wife, Patty, kept busy by putting in hours at one of the family’s car dealerships. She also drew a paycheck from PK Flowers Interiors, Inc., a home designer offering services ranging from by-the-hour consultations to full-scale remodeling.
The couple has at least two fashionable places to hang their hats: their million-plus dollar home in Weatherford, Texas, and a $1 million-plus vacation spot just outside the city of Marble Falls, Texas. Williams borrowed more than $250,000 in 2012 to carve out a place for he and his wife at Horseshoe Bay Resort, a tony Texas community that boasts four professionally designed golf courses, a yacht club and dedicated spa.
In addition to the lakeside property, Williams has indulged his collector’s eye by amassing $1 million-plus in “sports memorabilia,” “political and military artifacts” and “historical documents,” as well as traditional art and photographs. He’s also tucked away at least $250,000 in an irrevocable trust for his children.
The guy is also quite the giver — to himself, anyway.
He’s owed upwards of $250,000 from his congressional campaign and one of his corporate holdings. Williams Chrysler Dodge Jeep, meanwhile, is on the hook to him for north of a cool million.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $2.79M |
| Real estate | $28.40M |
| Trusts | $0.25M |
| Bank accounts | $0.08M |
17.Rep. Alan Grayson
D-Fla.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #17 | $26.18M | $31.68M | $5.50M |
| Previous year | #21 | $16.69M | $22.79M | $6.10M |
| Change | 4 | 56.88% | 39.02% | -9.84% |
Grayson founded the Grayson Fund Management Co. after losing his first re-election bid in 2010, a career change that allowed him to dive into asset management. His stake in the firm is worth at least $5 million, according to his financial disclosure report. His portfolio also includes at least $1 million of stock in Collectors Universe, which authenticates coins, sports cards, autographs and stamps; the aviation leasing firm Fly Leasing; and Northern Tier Energy. Other significant holdings are in drugstore chain CVS and Russia’s second-biggest oil company, Lukoil. Grayson also reported more than $1.25 million of options in China Mobile.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $25.13M |
| Real estate | $0.00M |
| Trusts | $0.00M |
| Bank accounts | $6.55M |
18.Rep. Chris Collins
R-N.Y.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #18 | $22.50M | $22.50M | $0.00M |
| Previous year | #17 | $22.26M | $22.26M | $0.00M |
| Change | -1 | 1.05% | 1.05% | 0.00% |
Before coming to Congress in 2012, Collins was a successful businessman who used his management experience during a term as Erie County executive and his financial disclosure reflects his ties to Western New York.
Collins has significant investments in local companies including $5 million in Volland Electric in Buffalo, N.Y. He also has investments worth at least $5 million dollars in Buffalo's ZeptoMetrix Corporation, which is a biotechnology organization that focuses on infectious diseases and the immune system.
However, geography isn’t Collins’ only link to those particular companies. He worked for both ZeptoMetrix and Volland in the past and his wife, Mary Sue, is listed as receiving income from those two groups. However, Collins did not report his wife’s exact income, since House rules stipulate that for spouses, only the source and type of income must be disclosed.
The biotech investments also expand overseas, most notably to Innate Immunotherapeutics, a biotech company that develops technology that applies to the human immune system in an effort to combat certain cancers and diseases. In 2012, Collins invested in the company’s New Zealand offices. Collins expanded that investment in 2013 to the company’s Australia offices, purchasing $3 million in Innate Immunotherapeutics stock.
Collins’ investment in the biotech industry is well suited for his congressional subcommittee assignments. He is a member of the Agriculture Subcommittee on Horticulture, Research, Biotechnology and Foreign Agriculture. He also chairs the Small Business Subcommittee on Health and Technology.
For the second year in a row, Collins reported no liabilities.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $18.97M |
| Real estate | $1.42M |
| Trusts | $0.00M |
| Bank accounts | $2.12M |
19.Rep. Rodney Frelinghuysen
R-N.J.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #19 | $22.21M | $22.21M | $0.00M |
| Previous year | #18 | $20.91M | $20.91M | $0.00M |
| Change | -1 | 6.23% | 6.23% | 0.00% |
Nine years ago, he was pegged the 11th richest member, but his wealth relative to his colleagues started slipping soon after. After coming in at 16 on 2012's list and landing at 18 last year, he has dropped another place, in part because the value floor for his expansive stock and real estate portfolio declined 17 percent to $17.3 million from $20.9 million.
A more public change for him came last November, when he was named chairman of the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee after the death of Florida Rep. C.W. Bill Young. The subcommittee takes the lead for the House in apportioning to the military slightly more of federal discretionary spending every year.
Frelinghuysen, along with half a dozen family trusts, maintains positions in more than 100 health care, technology, energy, financial services and consumer products companies. None is among the biggest defense contractors, but he owns between $50,000 and $100,000 worth of General Electric, which is providing more than $2 billion in communications systems to the Pentagon this year, and between $100,000 and $250,000 of Federal Express, which does at least $1 billion in annual deliveries for the military. He holds stock in at least a dozen other businesses that sell goods and services to the Defense Department and other government agencies.
About a third of his wealth, at least $6 million, is in the Proctor & Gamble stock he’s inherited. His mother, born Beatrice Sterling Procter, was a descendent of one of the personal care conglomerate’s founders.
Frelinghuysen also has more than $1 million invested in IBM and with the Daily Income Fund, a money market. He’s got at least that much in his checking account at a bank that caters to the high-net-worth residents in New Jersey’s horse country. And he’s got land worth about $600,000 at the outer edge of the New York suburbs and in the Berkshire Mountains of Massachusetts. Frelinghuysen reported no liabilities.
The congressman’s investments will gain additional scrutiny if, as expected, he becomes chairman of the Appropriations Committee in 2017. Kentucky Republican Harold Rogers will have reached his three-term limit then. Next year, Frelinghuysen will be second in majority party seniority and he remains safely ensconced in a district that covers many of the wealthiest and best-educated communities in the state, where his family has been a political force since the Revolution. When he arrived in the House in 1995, he became the sixth Frelinghuysen in Congress.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $20.56M |
| Real estate | $0.60M |
| Trusts | $0.00M |
| Bank accounts | $1.05M |
20.Rep. Diane Black
R-Tenn.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #20 | $21.24M | $32.24M | $11.00M |
| Previous year | #14 | $24.94M | $34.44M | $9.50M |
| Change | -6 | -14.85% | -6.40% | 15.79% |
Part of the shortfall is attributable to a change in value of certain stock investments owned by Black's husband. The couple jointly listed a higher debt in 2013 than they did in 2012 — at least $11 million in mortgages on properties they own throughout Nashville, as compared to the $9.5 million minimum they listed the year before. Their initial rise in the wealth ranks since Black was elected to Congress in 2010 was also precipitated by the sale of her husband's forensic science company, Aegis Sciences Corp., to a New York private equity firm in late 2010.
But the second-term lawmaker still cleared the list's top 20 wealthiest lawmakers, thanks in part to continued, substantial investments in Tennessee real estate. All told, Black and her spouse jointly own least $19 million worth of properties throughout Nashville, plus a home in Panama City, Fla., with a minimum value of $250,000.
Black's husband, David, also lists numerous and significant stocks connected to Aegis, which began as a "sports anti-doping laboratory at Vanderbilt University" that the couple founded and where he still serves as president and chief executive officer.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $12.99M |
| Real estate | $19.25M |
| Trusts | $0.00M |
| Bank accounts | $0.00M |
21.Rep. Joseph Kennedy III
D-Mass.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #21 | $20.00M | $20.83M | $0.83M |
| Previous year | #23 | $15.25M | $15.33M | $0.08M |
| Change | 2 | 31.15% | 35.88% | 937.47% |
Kennedy, the son of former Rep. Joseph P. Kennedy II and grandson of Robert F. Kennedy, is worth nearly $20 million, most of it held in a series family trusts. He’s currently the only Kennedy in Congress, winning election in 2012 after working as a county prosecutor.
The trust holdings cover a wide-range of stocks spread across many sectors, among them Exxon, General Electric, Disney, McDonald's, Google and Coca Cola. His disclosure lists a few dozen stock market transactions over the past year, but none valued at more than $50,000.
Kennedy, who debuted on the list as the 23rd richest lawmaker last year, moved up a spot this year as his wealth grew by more than $3.5 million as the stock market continued to rise.
His largest liabilities are mortgages he holds with his wife, Lauren Anne Birchfield, in Massachusetts and Washington, D.C., on personal residences. The couple owes at least $500,000 on the mortgage for their property in the District, while the mortgage on their Bay State home is about half that.
Like last year, Kennedy lists about $80,000 in student loans owed by his wife. Birchfield, who he met in law school at Harvard, works for the National Partnership for Women and Families but does not list a salary. She also received a $31,000 consulting fee from Boston Medical Center.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $0.72M |
| Real estate | $0.00M |
| Trusts | $18.97M |
| Bank accounts | $1.13M |
22.Sen. Jim Risch
R-Idaho
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #22 | $19.24M | $19.79M | $0.55M |
| Previous year | #19 | $19.18M | $19.74M | $0.56M |
| Change | -3 | 0.31% | 0.25% | -1.79% |
His net worth increased about $100,000 to a minimum of $19.2 million, but he dropped a few slots on the list as members with stock-driven investments saw their portfolios grow faster.
Risch’s largest holdings are ranch and farm lands in southwest Idaho, including three parcels worth at least $5 million apiece. He collects at least $5,000 annually on each of the properties in royalty and rent payments.
Risch sits on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, where he has sought to look out for the interest of Western landowners. In particular, Risch opposes the federal reintroduction and protection of gray wolves in the West that have killed calves on some of his land.
Additionally, Risch owns several commercial properties and is involved with several real estate partnerships, including an office building in Boise that he collected at least $5,000 in rent on last year.
Like past years, Risch also reports more than $250,000 in outstanding notes from his 2002 GOP primary campaign for lieutenant governor, which he won.
Risch also owns a condominium in Washington, D.C., worth at least $250,000.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $2.82M |
| Real estate | $16.92M |
| Trusts | $0.00M |
| Bank accounts | $0.05M |
23.Sen. Bob Corker
R-Tenn.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #23 | $19.12M | $19.12M | $0.00M |
| Previous year | #22 | $16.68M | $18.68M | $2.00M |
| Change | -1 | 14.65% | 2.37% | -100.00% |
The lion’s share of Corker’s wealth comes from several real estate investments, including The Volunteer Building in Chattanooga, Tenn., which was valued at a least $5 million. Corker owned a construction company, then became a real estate developer before ultimately being elected mayor of Chattanooga. He was later courted to run for the Senate by former Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn.
Corker also reported at least a $5 million interest in Pointer (QP) LP, a private investment partnership also based in Chattanooga. He also disclosed a $1 million investment in Gerber Taylor Partners and $1 million in Gerber Taylor Global Hedge L.P., both investment funds based in Memphis.
Corker reported no liabilities. Last year he listed a pair of mortgages connected to his Corker Properties Ltd. that were worth at least $1 million apiece and date to 1998.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $12.50M |
| Real estate | $5.52M |
| Trusts | $0.00M |
| Bank accounts | $1.10M |
24.Sen. Claire McCaskill
D-Mo.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #24 | $18.38M | $18.93M | $0.55M |
| Previous year | #24 | $14.93M | $15.23M | $0.30M |
| Change | 0 | 23.09% | 24.28% | 83.33% |
Most of her wealth stems from her husband, Joseph Shepard. The St. Louis businessman primarily made his fortune developing affordable housing and nursing homes around the nation.
Shepard reported three transactions of more than $1 million, including a sale related to the New Zealand-based Fisher Funds. The other two transactions were purchases. McCaskill also reported receiving $70,000 from Simon & Schuster for a yet to be titled book.
Shepard’s wealth became a topic of interest during McCaskill's last campaign, particularly over government subsidies he received in connection with his development business.
Shepard’s assets include a minimum of $1 million each in Missouri and Georgia House Tax Credit Funds. He also has at least $1 million each invested in The Terrace Apartments and The Lockwood Group, a development firm.
Shepard is also listed as holding at least $1 million worth of Berkshire Hathaway Class A shares, which sell for just over $200,000 each. He also holds at least $15,001 of the Class B shares. Berkshire Hathaway is a U.S.-based conglomerate owned by billionaire investor Warren Buffett. Buffett’s concern that his secretary paid a higher tax rate than he did became a principle — known as the Buffett Rule — pushed by Democrats that everyone should pay their "fair share" in taxes.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $10.22M |
| Real estate | $8.62M |
| Trusts | $0.00M |
| Bank accounts | $0.08M |
25.Rep. Tom Petri
R-Wis.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #25 | $15.64M | $16.24M | $0.60M |
| Previous year | #36 | $9.91M | $11.01M | $1.10M |
| Change | 11 | 57.81% | 47.50% | -45.45% |
Of course, much of that growth may be attributable to how his assets are counted on his financial disclosure, but Petri has made some savvy, if not controversial, investments.
Petri is currently the subject of an Ethics Committee investigation due to his ownership of more than $500,000 in the Oshkosh Corp. The defense contractor, which resides in Petri’s district, has seen sharp stock gains thanks in part to Pentagon contracts that Petri advocated for.
Petri’s financial disclosure, which is in many places almost illegible, also lists more than $5 million in stock in U.S. Bank and Walgreens.
Petri’s liabilities include a mortgage of more than $100,000 and a loan from Merrill Lynch of more than $500,000, which is down from $1 million from last year.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $16.20M |
| Real estate | $0.02M |
| Trusts | $0.02M |
| Bank accounts | $0.02M |
26.Rep. Richard Hanna
R-N.Y.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #26 | $15.30M | $15.32M | $0.02M |
| Previous year | #25 | $14.38M | $14.40M | $0.02M |
| Change | -1 | 6.43% | 6.42% | -0.01% |
Hanna holds at least $250,000 in PepsiCo and a minimum of $500,000 in Chevron. His Fidelity money market account is worth a minimum of $500,000, a decrease from last year. His real estate assets include Gabriel Group LLC., in Utica, N.Y.
Held jointly with his wife, Hanna has a minimum of $20,000 in liabilities owed to Chase and American Express.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $13.15M |
| Real estate | $2.00M |
| Trusts | $0.00M |
| Bank accounts | $0.17M |
27.Sen. John McCain
R-Ariz.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #27 | $15.17M | $15.32M | $0.15M |
| Previous year | #57 | $6.32M | $9.77M | $3.45M |
| Change | 30 | 139.94% | 56.81% | -95.79% |
The McCain fortune is almost entirely thanks to the senator’s wife, Cindy. For the past two decades, she has been the controlling stockholder in Hensley & Co., which her father, Jim, started in a quite sleepy Arizona in the 1950s but which has grown to become the largest beverage distributor in the burgeoning state as well as the third-largest Anheuser-Busch distributor in the country.
The senator’s minimum net worth more than doubled in the past year, to $15.1 million, because of significant gains in the McCain investments and big time reductions in the couple’s debts.
Their assets increased more than 35 percent because of a newly established portfolio of Charles Schwab accounts, held in Cindy McCain’s name, worth at least $3.4 million, along with four notes receivable from various McCain family trusts worth at least $3.25 million. On the other side of the ledger, Cindy McCain repaid more than $3.4 million in virtually interest-free promissory notes owed to the family business. That left as the couple’s only liabilities balances totaling more than $145,000 on a quartet of her credit cards.
That improved picture marked a big financial rebound for McCain, who had seen his millions shrink steadily since he last ran for president. His net worth was at least $20 million just six years ago, when he was the 13th wealthiest member of Congress.
His family money became an issue that year, when he conceded he couldn’t recall how many houses he owned. Democrats, led by their nominee Barack Obama, took delight in labeling that memory lapse as evidence McCain was way out of touch with the economic concerns of everyday Americans. The senator’s most recent disclosures makes that tally more clear. The couple still owns at least five residences: Their voting home in Phoenix, three properties in luxurious neighborhoods in southern California and the family’s picturesque getaway between Sedona and Cottonwood, Ariz., the ranch where McCain interviewed then-Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska to be his running mate.
Beyond his Senate salary and some royalties for his books, the only income McCain added to the 2013 ledger was his $71,000 pension from his quarter-century in the Navy.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $9.57M |
| Real estate | $1.23M |
| Trusts | $4.37M |
| Bank accounts | $0.15M |
28.Sen. John Hoeven
R-N.D.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #28 | $15.16M | $16.16M | $1.00M |
| Previous year | #26 | $14.21M | $15.21M | $1.00M |
| Change | -2 | 6.66% | 6.23% | 0.00% |
The North Dakotan’s two largest holdings are the same as in 2013: at least $5 million in stock of Westbrand Inc. Bank Holding Co., based in Minot, N.D., that produced at least $100,000 in dividends, and at least $5 million in the Minnesota medical equipment company Northwest Respiratory Services LLC, which produced $2.3 million in income.
Hoeven is an active trader and holds an array of blue-chip stocks, including at least $100,000 in McDonald's, Microsoft, Intel, Johnson and Johnson, General Mills and Coca-Cola stock. He has a financial interest in high-end fashion with at least $100,000 in Coach stock and $50,000 in Ralph Lauren stock. And closer to his North Dakota roots, the Senate Agriculture Committee member owns at least $100,000 in John Deere stock.
His largest investment over the past year was $500,000 in Mainstream Investors LLC, a North Dakota company created in 2012 to provide capital for the state’s exploding oil and national gas production operations. He also made at least $100,000 when Berkshire Hathaway acquired HJ Heinz and brought out its stockholders.
Hoeven remains a director of the First Western Bank in Minot where he began his banking career in the 1980s. He’s due to receive a monthly pension of $837.74 from the bank when he retires and still maintains a checking account there with at least a million dollars in it.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $15.16M |
| Real estate | $0.00M |
| Trusts | $0.00M |
| Bank accounts | $1.00M |
29.Rep. Curt Clawson
R-Fla.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #29 | $13.53M | $13.80M | $0.27M |
| Previous year | n/a | |||
| Change | -29 | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% |
Other holdings include at least $500,000 in Clawson Investments LLC, which invests in Endocyte Inc., a biotech company, and at least $500,000 in the Widsomtree Japan Hedge Equity Fund, which has positions in companies including Toyota Motor Corp. and Mitsubishi Financial Group. The lawmaker's portfolio also includes at least $500,000 in New York city and state bonds. Clawson's liabilities include a margin account with Deutsche Bank worth at least $250,000.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $11.82M |
| Real estate | $1.77M |
| Trusts | $0.00M |
| Bank accounts | $0.22M |
30.Sen. Ron Johnson
R-Wis.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #30 | $13.52M | $13.52M | $0.00M |
| Previous year | #29 | $12.47M | $12.47M | $0.00M |
| Change | -1 | 8.36% | 8.36% | 0.00% |
Johnson's single biggest asset is a money market account at Charles Schwab worth between $5 million and $25 million. He maintains a $1 million to $5 million stake in Pacur Inc., a plastics manufacturer he launched with his brother-in-law that's involved in medical device packaging and high-tech printing applications.
Johnson also has a 9.9 percent ownership stake worth between $250,000 and $500,000 in DPLenticular Ltd., a 3D printing business based in Ireland.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $7.67M |
| Real estate | $5.10M |
| Trusts | $0.00M |
| Bank accounts | $0.75M |
31.Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner
R-Wis.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #31 | $13.04M | $13.04M | $0.00M |
| Previous year | #32 | $10.99M | $10.99M | $0.00M |
| Change | 1 | 18.57% | 18.57% | 0.00% |
Sensenbrenner, who’s spent the maximum permissible six years in the top GOP seat on both the Judiciary and Science committees, is among the relatively few members who disclose more about their finances than the Hill’s rules require. He provides hundreds of pages of down-to-the-penny detail about his diversified portfolio of securities and their performances as part of 14 different family trusts. The records show the worth of his investments grew by 18 percent, or $2 million, in the past year, to just above $13 million. (Had he stuck with the ranges of value on the House forms, his minimum net worth would have looked to be a little more than half as much and he might not appear on the 50 Richest roster.)
Two trusts, created to benefit Sensenbrenner’s now-adult sons, hold a combined $2.3 million in stock issued by Kimberly-Clark and a pair of its spinoffs. The other trusts have no holdings in the family business. Instead, the congressman’s biggest stakes, worth $500,001 to $1 million, are shares in AbbVie, Exxon Mobil, Pfizer and Philip Morris.
Sensenbrenner supplemented his congressional salary with $45,000 in fees as a trustee of the family holdings and a $31,000 pension from his decade in the Wisconsin legislature. He also reported spending three recess weeks overseas (in Seoul, Tel Aviv and Munich) on educational trips paid for by nonprofits seeking to promote international good will.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $6.92M |
| Real estate | $0.00M |
| Trusts | $6.11M |
| Bank accounts | $0.00M |
32.Sen. Mitch McConnell
R-Ky.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #32 | $11.97M | $11.97M | $0.00M |
| Previous year | #39 | $9.23M | $9.23M | $0.00M |
| Change | 7 | 29.71% | 29.71% | 0.00% |
The Kentucky Republican’s reportable assets nearly tripled in 2008 thanks to a $5 million gift that he and his wife, former Labor Secretary Elaine L. Chao, received from her father, James, soon after the death of her mother. (After emigrating in the 1960s, the senator’s father-in-law founded a successful international trading business, now called the Foremost Group, specializing in importing Chinese-made goods to the United States.) The money has been invested ever since in a tax-exempt money market fund that remains the McConnells’ most significant asset by far.
The fact that McConnell has become so much better-off during his three decades in Congress has recently become an issue in his highly competitive re-election campaign. His Democratic challenger, Kentucky Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes, aired a television ad in August alleging the incumbent had overstayed his welcome in the Senate by becoming “a multimillionaire in public office” while opposing minimum wage increases, fighting unemployment insurance extensions and supporting “tax breaks that send Kentucky jobs overseas.”
McConnell has not listed any liabilities for several years, and the bulk of the most recent increase in the value of his assets is attributable to investment gains by Chao. One of her mixed investment funds increased in value by at least $500,000, while the disclosure forms for the first time mentioned a pension investment fund in which she’s invested at least $500,000. Chao also received deferred compensation of at least $250,000 from Protective Life Corp., a life insurance business where she was on the board of directors.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $11.34M |
| Real estate | $0.00M |
| Trusts | $0.63M |
| Bank accounts | $0.00M |
33.Sen. Tom Harkin
D-Iowa
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #33 | $11.85M | $11.85M | $0.00M |
| Previous year | #30 | $11.88M | $11.88M | $0.00M |
| Change | -3 | -0.22% | -0.22% | 0.00% |
Harkin himself owns very few assets — he has a bank account with Morgan Stanley worth between $1,001 and $15,001 and another in LPL Financial whose worth is in the same range. He also has three investments worth between $1,001 and $15,001.
Most of the assets belong to Harkin's wife, Ruth. The two most valuable assets are an investment in ConocoPhillips, and another in United Technology Corp., both owned by Ruth Harkin, each totaling at least $1 million. The Harkins made at least $100,000 in dividends on the ConocoPhillips investment, and at least $100,000 from an investment in Phillips 66.
Ruth Harkin was on the board of directors ConocoPhillips until last May. She previously served as senior vice president for international affairs and government relations for United Technologies and reported receiving a pension of at least $1,000 from the company this year.
She also earned at least $1,000 from Ireland’s National Toll Road as compensation for board membership, but does not currently hold any stock in the company.
Roll Call Member profile »
Assets by type
| Investments | $10.77M |
| Real estate | $0.50M |
| Trusts | $0.00M |
| Bank accounts | $0.58M |
34.Rep. Brad Schneider
D-Ill.
| Rank | Net worth | Minimum assets | Minimum liabilities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This year | #34 | $11.71M | $11.81M | $0.10M |
| Previous year | #35 | $9.93M | $10.03M | $0.10M |
| Change | 1 | 18.01% | 17.83% | 0.00% |
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