President Obama's aide failed to disclose $40K payout (shocker: from SEIU)

President Barack Obama’s political director failed to disclose that he was slated to receive a nearly $40,000 payout from a large labor union while he was working in the White House.

Patrick Gaspard, who served as the political director for the Service Employees International Union local 1199, received $37,071.46 in “carried over leave and vacation” from the union in 2009, but he did not disclose the agreement to receive the payment on his financial disclosure forms filed with the White House.

In a section on his financial disclosure where agreements or arrangements for payment by a former employer must be disclosed, Gaspard checked a box indicating that he had nothing to report.

Bill Burton, a White House spokesman, told POLITICO Monday that Gaspard was in the process of correcting his disclosure form to reflect that he did in fact have an agreement for severance.

“We have made the small administrative change to this year's and last year's forms to indicate that part of the final payment to Patrick reflected their typical severance of one week of pay for each of his nine years of service at Local 1199 of SEIU,” Burton wrote POLITICO in an e-mailed statement.

Such financial disclosures are governed by federal law, but Stan Brand, a former House general counsel and ethics expert, said the Justice Department is unlikely to pursue an investigation unless they suspected a “knowing or willful” intent to deceive.

Gaspard’s omission is a potentially embarrassing episode for the Obama administration, which has made a high priority of ethics.

“They’ve made ethics a fetish and they have all kinds of people over there with experience, so I don’t know how they missed this one,” Brand said.

Gaspard spent nine years at 1199 SEIU, a major labor union in New York. Gaspard also worked for Obama’s campaign, and later worked for the transition team, where he earned $11,500, according to the financial disclosure form he filed this year. He was pulling a salary from SEIU until Jan. 16, 2009, shortly before Obama was inaugurated.

Gaspard, who made $172,200 in 2009, has from $35,000 to $80,000 in credit card debt and student loans, according to his financial disclosures.

This SEIU payout was first raised in early June by Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), the top GOP lawmaker on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. He sent a letter to the White House asking for information about the payment. They have yet to respond

White House under seige.

PATRICK GASPARD

SEIU's man in the Obama White House is longtime operative Patrick Gaspard. He holds the title of White House political affairs director, the same title Karl Rove held in President Bush's White House. He's the President’s fixer and the man who gets ACORN projects and money. Gaspard once worked for ACORN CEO Bertha Lewis.

Patrick Gaspard’s brother Michael Gaspard works for The Advance Group....ACORN’s registered lobbying organization and also with ACORN’s national spokesman Bertha Lewis. Michael apparently keeps a lower profile than his brother. He does not appear on lobbyist disclosures for The Advance Group NY State. Nonetheless, he works there. Ms. Lewis’s contacts list confirms Michael Gaspard’s employment there.

ACORN Shaun Donovan. Mr. Donovan is HUD Secy. Before that, Mr. Donovan was NYC Commissioner of Dept of Housing Preservation and Development (HPD)---where Donovan worked on affordable housing initiatives----projects right up ACORN’s alley.

ACORN Karine Jean-Pierre is WH liaison for Dept of Labor (headed by latino agitator Hilda Solis). Karine once worked for John Edwards (vertical or horizontal?). She left there to work for Cong Anthony Weiner, then became Barack Obama’s regional political director.

ACORNS EVERYWHERE Senate Finance Committee Study

ACORN comprises a mind-boggling 94 different affiliates, that amounts to "a big shell game," a biting Senate Finance Committee study shows. The study, by the staff of Iowa Republican Charles Grassley, reveals four ACORN charity groups give more than half their revenue to taxable entities that engage in "impermissible lobbying and political activity." ACORN and it’s subsidiaries for decades have moved taxpayer money into their own pockets and into the left-wing Marxist machine.

Sen Charles Grassley's documents show leaders of ACORN community groups transferred several million dollars in charitable and government money-----meant for the poor---- to parts of the group that have political (and sometimes profit-making) missions.

Sen Grassley's documents indicate that ACORN's tax-exempt groups----along with its tangled web of allied organizations---- used more than half their charitable and public money in 2006 to pay other ACORN affiliates.

Thanks STARWISE. Somebody wake me if the "news" programs, or Jon Stewart, or SNL, beats the drum about this and related lack of ethics by Zerobots for the next couple of years.

President Barack Obama's political director failed to disclose that he was slated to receive a nearly $40,000 payout from a large labor union while he was working in the White House. Patrick Gaspard, who served as the political director for the Service Employees International Union local 1199, received $37,071.46 in "carried over leave and vacation" from the union in 2009, but he did not disclose the agreement to receive the payment on his financial disclosure forms filed with the White House. In a section on his financial disclosure where agreements or arrangements for payment by a former employer must be disclosed, Gaspard checked a box indicating that he had nothing to report.

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