Current News

/

ArcaMax

Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, a millionaire, set up new company before signing financial disclosure bills

Beth LeBlanc and Craig Mauger, The Detroit News on

Published in News & Features

Voters in 2022 approved a ballot measure 66%-34% that expanded term limits in the state House and Senate and required lawmakers and the governor, lieutenant governor, attorney general and secretary of state — as well as candidates for those offices — to file financial disclosures.

The nuts and bolts of what information would need to be included in the personal financial disclosures was largely left to lawmakers, who were able to narrowly pass statutory language implementing the disclosures amid pushback that the requirements didn’t shed enough light on lawmakers' finances and potential conflicts that may arise from those interests. The legislation exempted the income and assets of spouses after Whitmer expressed reservations about requiring such public disclosures.

The Legislature signed off on the bills implementing the financial disclosure requirement Nov. 9; Whitmer signed the bills into law Dec. 8.

The first round of disclosures filed Monday saw significant differences in the level of detail each official provided, some opting to provide more information than was required and others offering only those details mandated by law.

Whitmer's report

Whitmer reported more than $2.3 million in the value of her investment and stock accounts in addition to her roughly $159,000 annual salary as governor. Among the $2.3 million in investments, stocks and securities, Whitmer disclosed more than $1 million in Admiral shares in Vanguard Total Stock Market Index Fund.

 

Whitmer’s financial reporting, in some ways, went beyond what was required of officials; she disclosed actual dollar amounts while many state lawmakers reported the existence of retirement or investment funds without detailing how much they were worth.

Whitmer reported the formation of Super Deluxe LLC under a portion of the reporting document requiring officials to disclose “positions in organizations.”

The governor has previously said that "super deluxe" was a saying used by her her late mother, Sharon.

Business incorporation papers list Trebilcock as the resident agent and attorney J. Thomas MacFarlane as the organizer.

...continued

swipe to next page

©2024 www.detroitnews.com. Visit at detroitnews.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Comments

blog comments powered by Disqus