Acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker's public financial disclosure forms show a man who made almost $1 million from a charity that claimed him as its only employee and who collected legal fees from a company charged with fraud.
The form, which Whitaker first filled out after taking over as Attorney General Jeff Sessions’s chief of staff, shows Whitaker drew a salary from the conservative Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust of $904,000 and collected $1,875 in legal fees from World Patent Marketing.
That company is notable because it shut down in May and agreed to pay a settlement of more than $25 million to resolve a Federal Trade Commission inquiry into its practices.
Whitaker also reported a $103,000 distribution from his own law firm and $15,000 in consulting fees from CNN, the form shows. He reported that he had two liabilities of between $10,000 and $15,000 in 2017 — both credit card accounts.
The disclosure report covers 2016 through October 2017, when Whitaker started at the Justice Department. Although Whitaker first signed it in November 2017, the report was revised several times after he took over as acting attorney general in the wake of Sessions’s ouster.
The Associated Press' Chad Day notes Whitaker's disclosure forms were revised as recently as today.
Even before his financial disclosure was made public, Whitaker’s finances had come under intense scrutiny.
Over the past two decades, Whitaker owned a day-care center, a concrete supply business and a trailer manufacturer; served as the U.S. attorney in Iowa; and before coming to the Justice Department to be Sessions’s chief of staff, did legal commentary and led the Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust, which described itself as a watchdog nonprofit dedicated to exposing unethical conduct by public officials.
Whitaker also was involved in a taxpayer-subsidized effort to rehabilitate an apartment building for affordable housing in Des Moines but made little progress — frustrating city leaders — and ultimately walked away from the project.
Acting Attorney General Matthew G. Whitaker's 2016-2017 public financial disclosure (via WaPo)