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SPEAKER NUÑEZ LIVING LARGE

"With a reported annual income of $130,062 and $170 of tax-free expenses for each day the Assembly is in session, it seems that Speaker Fabian Nuñez, the self proclaimed champion of the working poor, the frail, and the disadvantaged, has a very warped sense of California's middle class.

"While claiming that ‘There's not too big of a difference between how [he] live[s] and how most middle-class people live", Nuñez would be hard-pressed to explain this statement in his district, where eighty-two percent of the households Nuñez represents earn less than $50,000 a year.

"Champion of working people? This guy looks like Ivana Trump. At least Ivana stuck Donald with the bill, not campaign contributors.

"I wonder how the union members who are forced to fund Nuñez' campaigns feel about their dues being used to pay for ‘campaign expenses' at Louis Vitton and Nordstrom."

Ron Nehring, Chairman, California Republican Party

Fabian Nunez: "There's not too big a difference," he said, "between how I live and how most middle-class people live."

• "The spending, listed in mandatory filings with the state, includes $47,412 on United, Lufthansa and Air France airlines this year; $8,745 at the exclusive Hotel Arts in Barcelona, Spain; $5,149 for a ‘meeting" at Cave L'Avant Garde, a wine seller in the Bordeaux region of France; a total of $2,562 for two ‘office expenses' at Vuitton, two years apart; and $1,795 for a ‘meeting' at Le Grand Colbert, a venerable Parisian restaurant."
  
  
• "Other expenses are closer to home: a $1,715 meeting at Asia de Cuba restaurant in West Hollywood; a $317 purchase at upscale Pavilion Salon Shoes in Sacramento; a $2,428 meeting at 58 Degrees and Holding, a Sacramento wine bar and bistro; and $800 spent at Dollar Rent a Car in Kihei, Hawaii." (Nancy Vogel, "Nuñez Travels The World Like A High-Roller," The Los Angeles Times, 10/5/07)

Nuñez And Staff Contradict Each Other:

"These trips," he said, "at least the ones I've taken -- I feel very confident and comfortable that they're not only justified but necessary for the decisions I need to make on a daily basis."  Given a list of 99 entries culled from his campaign finance filings, however, Nuñez's staff refused to show how the expenditures were related to California government or politics. Spokeswoman Beth Willon would say only that the expenditures were "properly disclosed and described as required by law." (Nancy Vogel, "Nuñez Travels The World Like A High-Roller," The Los Angeles Times, 10/5/07)

Staff Refused to Justify How Expenditures Related To Government Or Politics:

• $2,562 at Louis Vuitton for "office expenses" (www.louisvuitton.com)
• $941 at Nordstrom for "office expenses" (www.nordstrom.com)
• $843 at Williams-Sonoma for "office expenses" (www.williams-sonoma.com)

Additional "Living Large Expenses"

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