Hillary Clinton has doggedly persisted in proclaiming that she will “if everybody agrees to do it.” In the last debate she even said “there are speeches for money on the other side. I know that.”
Oddly enough this never prompts the questions..”Who on the other side has given paid speeches? When and to whom did they give these speeches?”
WHO Gives These Speeches and Who Demands the Highest Fees?
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Donald Trump - $1.5M in 2006 and 2007 according to Forbes. Trump appeared at 17 seminars and collected this fee for each one.
- Hillary Clinton - $200K
- Bill Clinton - $200K
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Tim Geithner - $200K The former Treasury secretary
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Ben Bernanke - $200K to $400K The former chairman of the Federal Reserve’s international
- George W. Bush - $150K
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Condoleezza Rice - 150K former Secretary of State
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Larry Summers - $135K former Treasury secretary
- Al Gore - $100K
- Sarah Palin - $100K
- David Plouffe - $100K
- Chelsea Clinton - $75K
- Dick Cheney - $75K
- Mitt Romney - $68K
- Newt Gingrich - $60K
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Ron Paul - $50K After leaving the House of Representatives
- Jeb Bush - $50K
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Colin Powell & Madeline Albright - $50K former secretaries of state
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Liz Cheney - $20K Daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney
abcnews.go.com/...
There are ONLY two names on the list that are STILL in the race, Clinton and Trump, and ONLY one more that WAS in the race, Jeb Bush.
2016 Presidential Candidates
Elected Senators like Cruz and Sanders are expressly prohibited from giving paid speeches for personal gain.
From “ AN OVERVIEW OF THE SENATE CODE OF CONDUCT AND RELATED LAWS”
HONORARIA BAN
NO honoraria may be received by any Member, officer, or employee. An “honorarium” is a fee for any speech, appearance, or article (including for a series of speeches, appearances, or articles if the series is directly related to an individual’s Senate duties or if payment is made because of an individual’s Senate position). Necessary expenses of travel are not honoraria.
Can sitting governors give paid speeches? I couldn’t find a specific ban but I did find that John Kasich a former employee of Lehman Brothers did give paid speeches when he left congress in 2000 and no evidence that he has given speeches since being elected in 2010.
“We’ve heard about Hillary getting all this money,” he said. “Lot of people, you know, they get paid a lot of money. I did great.”
Mr. Kasich, who was elected governor of Ohio in 2010, was reminiscing about how pleasant his life was after he decided not to seek re-election to Congress in 2000.
He worked for Lehman Brothers from Columbus, Ohio, a job that he has taken to freely joking about in speeches, defying the conventional wisdom that it might not be such a good thing to highlight ties to Wall Street.
www.nytimes.com/…
Of course there is Donald Trump...who is reportedly the highest paid speaker in the country.
Topping the list by a longshot is billionaire birther and infamous reality-TV host Donald Trump. “The Donald earned a staggering $1.5 million per speech at The Learning Annex’s ‘real estate wealth expos’ in 2006 and 2007,” according to Forbes.
abcnews.go.com/…
Clinton as former Secretary of State gave her speeches to Goldman Sachs in 2012 and early 2013.
Whether it is credible to believe that she hadn’t decided to run for President or that Goldman Sachs didn’t believe Clinton would run is debateable. However, what is fairly clear is that Clinton wanted those speeches to remain private. She negotiated to maintain control over the release of the transcripts of those speeches.
Clinton's standard speaker's contract stipulated that the speech's host make a transcript that would then remain in Clinton's control.
Clinton has had a historically contentious relationship with the media so retaining control of her speech transcripts is most likely just a reasonable precaution to avoid unnecessary problems. However, that made her comment about needing to “look into it” sound more than a little evasive, especially since her “looking into it” resulted in her current...”I will when everybody does” response.
“I will look into it,” [Clinton] said. “I don’t know the status, but I will look into it... But, I can only repeat what is the fact, that I spoke to a lot of different groups with a lot of different constituents, a lot of different kinds of members about issues that had to do with world affairs...”
February 4, 2016 Town Hall MSNBC
Why It’s a Concern
Some seem to think this is about an objection to Clinton’s making money on speeches or that it is about changing a position on specific legislation:
Former elected officials who choose to run for president are much less likely to have the power to influence legislation because of speaking fees they were paid in the years before they ran for office. The U.S. President may be among the most powerful people in the world, but Congress is the nation’s most powerful entity.
The fracas about Clinton as a million-dollar speaker is merely name-calling, ad hominem attacks, and political maneuvering masquerading as legitimate criticism.
fortune.com/...
But actually, that article does a better job of pointing out that the GOP really has no credibility when it comes to attacking Clinton...but it is fairly damning in her defense!
A legitimate concern about paying former politicians high speaking fees is that it’s akin to buying influence. Even if those politicians don’t return to office, as Clinton might, they still know a lot of people in power who can do favors for them. And Wall Street’s C-suite executives are the most powerful influencers of all.
That’s why Republican strategist Karl Rove is on the attack. “Wall Street made [Hillary Clinton] a multi-millionaire,” intones an ad run by Rove’s American Crossroads Super PAC on the eve of the Iowa caucuses. “Does Iowa really want Wall Street in the White House?”
But if it’s wrong for a Democratic presidential candidate to take money from deep-pocketed American businesses, why is it okay for a Republican Super PAC to be funded by such organizations? The only way to completely eliminate the influence of corporations in politics is through the kind of campaign finance reform that many Republicans and Democrats alike are loath to bring about. And it’s no wonder. Thanks to U.S. Supreme Court decisions like McCutcheon v. FEC and Citizens United v. FEC, it’s in elected officials’ interests to keep the money coming in.
Politicians can’t have it both ways. Either big money is off-limits, or it’s not. Right now, it’s not, so it’s hypocritical for people like Rove to say “stop” to Hillary Clinton’s speaking fees and “go” to money from the same source for his political action committee.
Is There A Difference When Candidate’s are Paid to Speak Before an Industry They Openly Support and And Industries They Plan to Regulate?
From Clinton’s Website:
www.hillaryclinton.com/...
Hillary will:
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Veto Republican efforts to repeal or weaken Dodd-Frank.
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Tackle dangerous risks in the big banks and elsewhere in the financial system.
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Hold both individuals and corporations accountable when they break the law.
Hillary would also hold both corporations and individuals on Wall Street accountable by:
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Prosecuting individuals when they break the law.
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Holding executives accountable when they are responsible for their subordinates’ misconduct.
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Holding corporations accountable when they break the law.
Here’s the difference between Clinton and Trump and even Kasich. Clinton was paid by an industry she affirmatively declares she promises to regulate and reform. In contrast BOTH Kasich and Trump’s allegiances are clear...as Republicans they support DEREGULATION. The voters ALREADY know that...because they FREELY express that position and are even PROUD of it!
Kasich who hasn’t received any large speaking fees anytime in the last 6 years has NEVER claimed to want to reform Wall St in fact he’s an unapologetic former employee of the now defunct Lehman Brothers AND openly “pro-Wall St”...and like most Republicans he fights AGAINST corporate regulations.
Trump is a real estate mogul who was paid to speak before other people in that industry! There is no secret that he supports the Real Estate industry.
In short the GOP candidates have ALREADY provided disclosure...that isn’t because they are more “honest”...There is simply no conflict between their stated political positions and the positions of the industries who paid them for speeches.
Follow the Money!
This old adage just insired me to look into www.opensecrets.org/... for the candidates’ corporate sponsorship to see if Trump or Kasich receive large amounts of support from their “industries” …Real Estate and Securities and Investment!
The results were interesting!
REAL ESTATE Industry CONTRIBUTIONS
1 HILLARY CLINTON |
$3,651,566 |
2 TED CRUZ |
$1,312,444 |
3 BERNIE SANDERS
|
$442,449 |
4 JOHN KASICH |
$419,389 |
5 DONALD TRUMP |
$82,000
|
www.opensecrets.org/...
Securities and investment Industry Contributions
1 Hillary Clinton |
$3,710,553 |
2 Ted Cruz |
$841,456 |
3 John Kasich
|
$381,576 |
4 Bernie Sanders |
$176,632 |
5 Donald Trump |
$23,612
|
www.opensecrets.org/...