Obamas Donated Less Than 1% of Their 2000-2004 Income (Update4)
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By Ryan J. Donmoyer and Julianna Goldman
March 25 (Bloomberg) -- Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama and his wife Michelle gave $10,772 of the $1.2 million they earned from 2000 through 2004 to charities, or less than 1 percent, according to tax returns for those years released today by his campaign.
The Obamas increased the amount they gave to charity when their income rose in 2005 and 2006 after the Illinois senator published a bestselling book. The $137,622 they gave over those two years amounted to more than 5 percent of their $2.6 million income.
Bill Burton, a campaign spokesman, said the Obamas gave as much as they could afford. He also said the Obamas gave $240,000 to charity in 2007, though they have yet to make last year's tax returns public.
``As new parents who were paying off their large student loans, giving $10,000 to charity was as generous as they could be at the time,'' Burton said. The tax returns don't reflect any donations for which they didn't or couldn't claim a deduction or any volunteer work they might have performed.
The Obamas' giving pattern is consistent with that of most other Americans, said University of Georgia Professor Russell James, who has studied the issue.
His analysis of more than 56,000 survey respondents from 1995-2005 found that 90 percent of donors give 2 percent or less of their pre-tax income to charities, including their churches. Americans who earn more than $150,000 on average gave about 2.2 percent of their income.
``It's not shocking,'' James said of the Obamas' philanthropy. ``It's about par for the course for Americans.''
Pressuring Clinton
The Obamas' charitable giving history was revealed as he became the first presidential candidate to release his tax returns for the decade and called on his rival for the Democratic nomination, New York Senator Hillary Clinton, to do the same.
``Releasing tax returns is a matter of routine, and we believe that the Clinton campaign should meet that standard and meet that routine standard now,'' said Robert Gibbs, Obama's communication director.
Clinton said today at a press conference in Greensburg, Pennsylvania, that she hopes to release her tax returns ``within the next week.'' Arizona Senator John McCain, the presumed Republican nominee, hasn't released his tax returns.
Presidential candidates aren't required to release their tax returns, which by law are confidential. Most have chosen to do so since the early 1970s.
Donations to Church
In 1998, then-Vice President Al Gore was criticized for donating only $353 to charity in 1997 despite earning $197,729. Gore, who was the 2000 Democratic nominee for president, responded by pointing to a history of philanthropy, including more than $50,000 in royalties from his book, ``Earth in the Balance.''
The Obamas made their church, Trinity United Church of Christ, one of the biggest beneficiaries of their philanthropy, donating $27,500. Obama is under scrutiny for his ties to the church because of comments made by its senior pastor.
The tax returns, 103 pages for all seven years released today, show the couple didn't begin claiming an itemized deduction for donations to the church until 2005, when they donated $5,000. They gave $22,500 a year later.
Angila Faison, a spokeswoman for the church, said it encourages its members to give 10 percent of their income to the church based on biblical instructions.
Little in Savings
The family's donations to all recipients totaled $2,350 in 2000, $1,470 in 2001, $1,050 in 2002, $3,400 in 2003, and $2,500 in 2004. They also paid federal taxes totaling $311,044 during the same period on their $1.2 million of income.
The Obamas' tax returns also show they had little in savings during the same period. They reported no dividends or capital gains over the five years and reported $33 in taxable interest, all of which was received in 2002.
Michelle Obama earned $12,000 in 2005 and $51,200 for serving as a director at Treehouse Foods Inc., a supplier for Wal-Mart Stores Inc. The couple earned $2,072 in 2005 from selling 3,400 shares in Avi Biopharma Inc., a Portland, Oregon- based drug company that was working on a treatment for avian flu.
They claimed a loss of $15,208 on the sale of 2,500 shares of Skyterra Communications Inc., a Reston, Virginia-based satellite communications company. The company's major investors included four friends and donors who raised more than $150,000 for his campaign committees, the New York Times reported a year ago.
Their biggest gift in 2005 and 2006 combined was $31,000 to Atlanta-based CARE, an organization fighting global poverty.
The Obamas also gave $13,107 to the Congressional Black Caucus in 2006 as well as $5,000 to the Muntu Dance Theatre, where Michelle Obama serves on a capital campaign committee with Bob Nash, a deputy campaign manager for Clinton.
To contact the reporters on this story: Ryan J. Donmoyer at e-mail [email protected]; Julianna Goldman at [email protected]
Last Updated: March 25, 2008 18:58 EDT
Guess it won't affect him very much at all....
