The late California Sen. Dianne Feinstein was one of the wealthiest members of Congress, with a Bay Area real estate empire worth tens of millions of dollars.
No matter who wins the Nov. 5 election and becomes California’s next senator, the fiscal situation will change dramatically.
Democratic Rep. Adam B. Schiff, 64, of Burbank, has worked for the government since graduating from Harvard Law School, serving as a law clerk to a federal district court judge and as a federal prosecutor in Los Angeles. Bureau, and serves in the state legislature. Sacramento, and since 2001, the House of Representatives.
Republican Steve Garvey, 75, graduated from Michigan State University and played 18 years as a first baseman for the Los Angeles Dodgers and San Diego Padres.
Since retiring from baseball in 1987, Mr. Garvey has worked as a paid public relations officer for more than a dozen companies, including two that violated federal regulators. Although he portrays himself as a successful businessman, he is hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt, according to financial disclosures and court filings.
Schiff’s steady investment
Mr. Schiff earns $174,000 as a member of Congress.
In a financial disclosure in August, Schiff said he made $40,000 last year through capital gains, stock dividends (some of which he shares with his wife, Eve) and royalties from his 2021 book “Midnight in Washington.” They reported earning an additional $3,310 to $134,000.
Mr. Schiff’s investment portfolio is worth between $1 million and $2.37 million and includes mutual funds, exchange-traded funds, and his wife’s Apple stock. He has mortgages on a condo in Burbank and a house outside Potomac, Maryland, with joint balances between $350,020 and $750,000.
Mr. Schiff’s net worth places him in the middle of California’s congressional delegation.
He is well below California’s richest members, Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Bonsall) and Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco), who had an estimated net worth of more than $200 million in 2023. , but that’s still far more than the congressman whose net worth is more than $200 million. Others, including Rep. Norma Torres (D-Pomona) and Rep. Mark DeSaulnier (D-Concord), are hovering around or below $0.
Schiff’s investment strategy has gradually shifted from individual stocks to mutual funds that hold shares in many companies, according to a review of Schiff’s financial disclosures by the Times. His wife’s Apple stock, worth between $101,001 and $250,000, is the only stock remaining in his portfolio.
From 2007 to 2009, Mr. Schiff sold hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of stock in Wyeth, the pharmaceutical giant that made Robituscin and Advil. The company was acquired by Pfizer in 2009, and Schiff sold the last of his Pfizer shares in 2015.
He also sold stocks in 2015 from an industry that Democrats have recently shunned. He sold up to $100,000 worth of stock in Altria, one of the world’s largest tobacco producers, and up to $60,000 worth of stock in gas and oil companies, including pipeline company Kinder Morgan.
Since the publication of his book in 2021, Schiff has reported earning up to $2.05 million in royalties over three years. The book details his work on investigations into the Trump administration and as lead prosecutor in Trump’s first Senate impeachment trial.
Garvey’s meager assets
In a disclosure statement filed with the U.S. Senate in August, Garvey reported that he earned $75,174 last year and earned an additional $66,295 from speaking engagements, signing memorabilia and other events. . Mr. Garvey also reported income from retirement plans, including a Major League Baseball pension, of between $60,000 and $130,000.
Garvey and his wife reported very modest assets. They have less than $30,000 in their checking account and only one investment in the stock market. Shares in Silicon Valley chipmaker Nvidia Inc. are worth less than $15,000.
The disclosure does not mention the large Spanish-style ranch where the couple lives in Palm Desert.
Garvey said the couple bought the house 10 years ago when her mother-in-law was planning to downsize. tell The interviewer responded that the house was “really a home for all of her grandchildren and I thought it was a special place, so I bought it from her.”
According to Riverside County real estate records, the deed to the house remained in Garvey’s mother-in-law’s custody until it was transferred to Sisters in Christ LLC in 2006. Records show the Utah company has named Mr. Garvey’s sister and mother-in-law as managers.
Tax bills for the home are sent to a La Quinta, Calif., address in a limited liability company controlled by Garvey’s mother-in-law, property records show. of sacramento bee He was the first to report that the property taxes on the house were paid by the Sisters in Christ.
Last year, the Coachella Valley Water District placed a lien on the Palm Desert home for $1,715.23 in “late fees, penalties and interest.” The invoice was sent to a limited liability company.
Garvey’s campaign did not respond to questions about his finances, including real estate holdings, investments and debt.
Jessica Levinson, a Loyola Law School professor and former chair of the Los Angeles Ethics Commission, said having a financial skeleton in your closet doesn’t inherently disqualify you as a candidate for public office.
The question is how candid Mr. Garvey, who is seeking a public role with “a degree of financial acumen,” in particular, will explain to the public about his debts, including how he accumulated them. “Is that what you mean?” she said.
“How people manage their personal finances doesn’t necessarily have a direct correlation to how they perform in their professional lives,” Levinson says. “But some may say, why can we trust them to keep our finances healthy if they can’t pay off the debt themselves?”
hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt
Garvey owes hundreds of thousands of dollars to private creditors and the government.
Some of the debt dates back to the 1990s, but Garvey made $1.25 million a year with the Padres for the first 10 years after retiring from baseball. He faced mounting costs, including legal fees, spousal support, and payments for children he had born out of wedlock.
In court statements in the 1990s, Garvey said he suffered a “financial disaster” after the Internal Revenue Service denied him tax credits he claimed related to investments made in the early 1980s. The Times reported in 2006. As a result of the IRS’s decision, Mr. Garvey owes $937,000. The charges include unpaid taxes, penalties, and interest.
“Are you going to pay off all your debt? Do you want to?” Garvey said in 2006. “The day I’m debt-free is the day I’ll be the happiest.”
Garvey has been sued at least seven times over unpaid debts, including by lawyers who handled the legal battle over one of his child support cases. The law firm claimed that Mr. Garvey owed nearly $200,000. Garvey agreed to pay $100,000 in a 2004 settlement. It is unclear whether the debt has been paid off.
Mr. Garvey, his wife and his company are the subject of hundreds of thousands of dollars in state, federal and tax liens, the first of its kind. reported Written by Politico. Garvey’s disclosure to the U.S. Senate lists tax liability of up to $750,000.
Garvey said earlier this year that he was working to pay off his tax debt. Records show the couple paid off several liens from the early 2000s and put down $25,000 on a 2006 lien.
However, there is no evidence that recent debts have been repaid. Riverside County tax records show the couple has more than $275,000 in IRS debt since 2010, including a $25,742.37 lien assessed last year for unpaid taxes from 2012. It also includes privileges.
Public relations officer of a company connected to a “pyramid scheme”
As California’s housing market boomed in the mid-2000s, Garvey took a job as a celebrity spokesperson for a mortgage broker in Orange County.
National Consumer Mortgage Corp. was run by former Cal State Fullerton baseball star Sam Fabata, who had been friends with Garvey for more than 30 years, Garvey later said. Fabata was known for throwing lavish parties at his Yorba Linda home, including one where Garvey was photographed mingling with customers in a Hawaiian shirt and khakis.
In addition to the mortgage business promoted by Garvey, Fabata operated a fraudulent investment division that promised returns of 30% to 60% to customers who refinanced their homes and invested cash. Fabata used funds from fraudulent new investors to pay monthly profits to previously invested customers. This is what is known as a Ponzi scheme.
Prosecutors said Fabata stole $32 million from the business before it collapsed. The Securities and Exchange Commission never accused Mr. Garvey of wrongdoing, but said Mr. Fabata used his fame to give the fraud an “aura of legitimacy.”
Before Fabata’s sentencing, Garvey wrote a letter to U.S. District Judge Andrew Guilford asking for mercy. Mr. Fabata was a “fundamentally polite and caring person who made a grave mistake,” Mr. Garvey wrote, adding that he was grateful to “step up to bat” for his friend. .
Fabata pleaded guilty to federal fraud charges and was sentenced to five years in prison, but Garvey said it was a “sad day.”
Mr. Garvey also joined a long line of creditors seeking to recover some money from the bankrupt company in bankruptcy court, filing a claim for $675,832 he says he is owed.
The trustee liquidating National Consumer Mortgage’s bankruptcy changed its mind and sought to recover the $157,000 Garvey had already received. The company’s trustees said at least $28,000 was transferred to Mr. Garvey in the three months leading up to the company’s bankruptcy.
Mr. Garvey denied wrongdoing. He agreed in 2010 to repay the $20,000 to the trustee in monthly installments of $400.
Seller of weight loss drugs and reverse mortgages
In 1999 and 2000, Garvey worked as a spokesperson for a weight loss supplement called Enforma, which contained ephedra, an amphetamine-like herb. It was then banned.
In a 30-minute infomercial, Garvey tells viewers that if they take two pills called “Fat Trapper” and “Exercise in a Bottle,” they will be able to eat barbecue ribs and buttered biscuits. He said you can lose weight while eating high-calorie foods such as.
The Federal Trade Commission sued Garvey in 2002, accusing him of making “materially false” claims about drugs. In a significant ruling for celebrity spokespeople, a federal court dominated Garvey claimed it was not responsible for false claims in the ads.
Most recently, Mr. Garvey returned to the mortgage industry to back an Orange County company that sells reverse mortgages and educates real estate agents on how to sell to customers. The reverse mortgage industry focuses exclusively on older Americans and has long relied on older celebrity salespeople, such as actors Tom Selleck and Henry Winkler.
Ten years ago, Garvey also sold some of his most financially valuable awards. at auctionthe 1981 Dodgers World Series Trophy (sold for $39,381.60) and the 1974 Most Valuable Player Award (sold for $68,481.60).
he He told the Palm Springs Desert Sun. Financial problems were not the reason for the sale. After overcoming his battle with prostate cancer, he said he wanted to raise money to spread awareness of the disease.
