G.O.P. Paid Almost $55,000 for Palin Fashion Stylist
December 5, 2008, 9:31 am
By Michael Luo
thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com
Gov. Sarah Palin campaigning in Virginia in October. (Photo: Michael Appleton for The New York Times)
Updated | 1:17 p.m. A woman who appears from campaign finance records to have been Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin’s fashion stylist was paid $54,900 by the Republican National Committee, according to a new report filed with the Federal Election Commission.
A charge for that amount to “Lisa Kline & Co.” for “Consulting-Campaign” appears on Oct. 17 in the R.N.C.’s latest campaign finance report. Ms. Kline is a New York stylist whose name had previously appeared alongside some of the much ballyhooed $150,000 in charges for clothing and other “campaign accessories” from luxury stores like Saks Fifth Avenue and Neiman Marcus.
Repeated calls to her home and office in New York over the last month or so since her name first appeared in reports were not returned.
The newest report appears to show about $23,000 in additional charges labeled as “campaign accessories” from a variety of stores, including Saks, Neiman’s, Nordstrom, Bloomingdales, Macy’s, Victoria’s Secret, Brooks Brothers, Ann Taylor and Target.
Republican officials have said that all of the clothing is now in their possession and will be turned over to charity.
In addition, the McCain campaign paid Ms. Palin’s traveling hair stylist and makeup artist more than $110,000 for roughly two months of work, according to campaign finance records.
As in the previous shopping charges, it appears from campaign finance records that people who initially purchased the clothes, or at least footed the charges, were subsequently reimbursed by the R.N.C.
Interestingly, in the newest charges on campaign finance records, many of the people who initially footed the charges were campaign staffers, including Andrew Smith, Ms. Palin’s chief of staff, Christopher Edwards, who was in charge of advance for Ms. Palin, and Kristi Pulsfort, a member of the traveling press staff.
Mr. Smith apparently footed the bill for more than $3,000 in charges at Aldo (a shoe store chain), Bloomingdales and Macy’s, all in Orlando, as well as Home Optics, a glasses and contacts store in Chugiak, Alaska, about a half hour from Ms. Palin’s home in Wasilla.
A woman named Jeannie Etchart, who appears on the McCain campaign’s payroll, picked up the most in charges, totaling more than $14,000 from places like Banana Republic, Neiman Marcus, Saks Fifth Avenue and Nordstrom.
The appearance of the staffers’ names in the records matches up with an account in Newsweek’s book on the campaign that was the first to report that there were additional charges for clothing beyond the initial $150,000 and said Ms. Palin used low-level staffers to purchase some of the items and put them on their credit cards. Newsweek said the McCain campaign discovered this just before the election when they sought repayment. |
