Cowboy boots ? 22 pairs. Stetson hats. Belt buckles. Cuff links. A TV. Medical tests for him and his wife. Nine hunting trips. Dozens of tickets to sports games and concerts.
Rick Perry earns a $150,000 annual salary and has a blind trust. But he?s also received over 90 personal gifts ? many of them from top donors and political appointees ? during his 11 years as Texas governor, according to personal financial statements he filed with the state.
Continue ReadingThe forms, obtained from the Texas Ethics Commission, only require officials to list broad value ranges for their assets and liabilities (in April, Perry reported that he owed between $10,000 and $25,000 for a loan to Mercedes-Benz Financial, and more than $25,000 each to Union Planters Bank and Wells Fargo). However, since gifts must be worth at least $250 to trigger the gift disclosure requirement, the total value of the 90 gifts Perry accepted during his governorship is at minimum $22,500, and potentially much more.
Texas ethics rules allow officeholders to accept gifts, provided they disclose them, and Perry campaign spokesman Mark Miner told POLITICO, ?All gifts are reported in accordance with Texas law.?
Perry?s gift givers are also among his most generous campaign backers, putting at least $6.4 million in contributions from themselves and their families into his three gubernatorial bids, according to a POLITICO analysis of data compiled by the watchdog group Texans for Public Justice. And at least 10 gift givers have gotten state appointments during the Perry administration.
Take insurance company owner Phil Adams of Bryan, Texas, whom Perry appointed to the board of regents of Texas A&M University in 2001 and reappointed in 2009.
Adams has contributed nearly $290,000 to Perry?s gubernatorial campaigns. Between 2005 and 2009, Adams?s company at times employed one or both of Perry?s two children, then in their late teens or 20s, to do secretarial work. And over the years, he?s given Perry, his wife Anita, and their children tickets to football and basketball games ? including the 2007 Big 12 basketball tournament ? and picked up the tab for their lodging and transportation to some of the games as well.
Houston auto dealer Dan Freidkin, whom Perry appointed to the Texas Parks and Wildlife Commission, has contributed $715,000 to his campaigns and paid for a 2007 hunting trip for the governor and his wife. Fellow Parks and Wildlife Commission appointee Dan Allen Hughes, Jr. footed the bill for Perry hunting trips in 2009 and 2010, as well as another trip of unspecified purpose last year.
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