Clark's Earnings Are Way Up
Speaking, Corporate Income Listed in Disclosure Report
By Thomas B. Edsall
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, December 16, 2003; Page A09
Presidential candidate Wesley K. Clark's income grew dramatically after he retired from the military, rising from $84,205 in 1999 to $1.61 million last year, according to his financial disclosure report.
Since his retirement, the retired four-star general and NATO commander has collected hundreds of thousands of dollars in speaking and consulting fees and $90,000 as a registered lobbyist. He also took over the chairmanship of a company seeking to sell motorized bicycles to the Pentagon and police agencies.
His net worth is between $3 million and $3.5 million, according to his campaign spokesman.
Christopher Lehane, Clark's spokesman, said that Clark was a highly successful general who "ended a genocide" in Kosovo and has been economically successful in his retirement because a number of companies "thought highly of him because of the success he had."
Clark's net worth is far less than the assets of Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.), who, with his wife, is worth an estimated $500 million. According to news accounts, the net worth of other Democratic candidates ranges from $13 million to $60 million for Sen. John Edwards (N.C.); $2.2 million to $5 million for former Vermont governor Howard Dean; and $2,000 to $32,000 for Rep. Dennis J. Kucinich (Ohio).
One of Clark's most lucrative decisions was to sign up with a booking agency, the Greater Talent Network Inc., which arranged 55 speeches for him from Feb. 2, 2002, to Sept. 23, 2003. Clark was paid a total of $1.41 million, or an average of just over $25,000 for each address.
Among those who paid for Clark's speeches were Lehman Brothers (four talks in Arizona, England, California and New York), Microsoft, Warner Home Video, American Express (two speeches, in Colorado and Connecticut), and Deloitte & Touche.
Some of the larger consulting and director's fees Clark received were: $162,723 from Acxiom Corp., a data processing company. Half of that was paid for lobbying the Pentagon, CIA, U.S. Senate and the Treasury, Commerce and Justice departments, among others, on "information transfers, airline security, and homeland security."
Clark served as chairman of the board of WaveCrest Labs, a Dulles maker of motorized bicycles that the firm sought to market to the Defense Department and police departments. WaveCrest paid Clark a director's and consulting fee of $195,645.
Goldman Sachs Capital Partners and the Goldman Sachs Groups Inc., paid Clark a total of $398,750 in consulting fees.
One of Clark's largest stock holdings, in SIRVA Inc./North American Van Lines Inc., is valued at between $250,000 and $500,000. The disclosure rules do not require reporting the exact value of assets, but break them into ranges. Clark, who served on the SIRVA board from March 2001 to October 2003, received a director's fee of $83,396.
Clark received a $75,000 advance on his recently published book, "Winning Modern Wars." If the book earns more than $75,000, Clark, according to his disclosure statement, will turn over all additional royalties to charity.
Lehane said Clark has given up all his posts on corporate boards except Messer Griesheim GmbH, a German firm where the practice is to resign at the end of the year.
Researcher Lucy Shackelford contributed to this report.
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