Clearly underestimated her chief of staff...
AOC 'living wage' rules allow her staff to dodge financial disclosure laws
The New York Democrat announced last week that she would institute “living wage” rules in her office, paying staff members a minimum of $52,000 a year and a maximum of $80,000 a year.
Under federal law, congressional employees who earn more than $126,000 a year — which includes most chiefs of staff — must submit public financial disclosure forms that detail outside income they earn, stock investments, debt, and gifts or paid trips that they are given by outside sources.
Ocasio-Cortez chief of staff Saikat Chakrabarti, a Silicon Valley entrepreneur, would be shielded from the public disclosure laws that apply to the vast majority of chiefs of staff in Congress.
Chakrabarti, 33, founded a Silicon Valley app-building company called Some Character LLC before taking an active role in left-wing politics. Last June, Chakrabarti purchased a $1.6 million home in Montgomery County, Md., according to real estate records reviewed by the
Washington Examiner.
The National Legal and Policy Center, a government watchdog group, said the $80,000 salary cap for Ocasio-Cortez’ senior staffers was concerning because it could be used to intentionally evade financial disclosure laws.
“Purposefully underpaying staffers in order to avoid transparency is an old trick some of the most corrupt members of Congress have used time and again,” said Tom Anderson, director of the NLPC’s Government Integrity Project.
“It would have [her] staffers fall below the financial threshold for public disclosures,” said Craig Holman, the public affairs lobbyist for Public Citizen, a government integrity group. “The cap that AOC would impose would bring the chief of staff under that threshold.”
