National Journal: Senate candidate spent $18,000 on hotel, $20,000 on travel.
AB Wire
California Senate candidate Kamala Harris is under fire for spending campaign dollars on luxury hotels, luxury cars and airline tickets.
National Journal, which reviewed disclosure reports her campaign filed with the Federal Election Commission, reported on Monday that the Indian American has spent nearly $18,000 on first-class accommodations.
For instance, one stay Washington’s St. Regis cost the campaign $1,886.
The Journal wrote that candidates typically spend mega dollars on “media buys, staff salaries and expensive fundraisers,” while choosing to save money on hotels by staying in cheaper hotels. “There are Holiday Inns in every city,” it quoted a Democratic strategist as saying. “You don’t have to stay in the Four Seasons, or Hotel Fusion, or the Waldorf. It’s unnecessary.”
In the article, titled “Posh Hotels And Pricey Airfare: Meet the Senate Candidate Driving Democrats Crazy,” the Journal said Harris’ campaign has spent almost $20,000 on “luxury car services and purchased expensive airfare — with some trips costing nearly $2,500.”
The report said the campaign has “already spent more than 40 percent of the $6 million” it raised since Harris announced her candidacy in January, which it termed as “an alarming burn rate for a candidate who is also on her second campaign manager and third finance director.”
Harris, the first female, African American and Asian American attorney general in California, is running for the open Senate seat being vacated by Barbara Boxer. Her main primary opponent is Rep. Loretta Sanchez.
The Journal said the campaign “declined to offer specific rationale for the some of the seemingly ostentatious purchases, saying instead in a statement that the expenses were necessary to raise money.”
Campaign spokesman Nathan Click told the publication in a statement that “Those line items in the report reflect a mix of staff and candidate travel, fundraising and event expenditures for fundraising events across the country.”