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Clinton talk ain't cheap
15/06/2006 10:16 - (SA)
Washington - Former president Bill Clinton raced back onto the paid speech circuit last year and raked in nearly $7.5m for talks that cost as much as $350 000 each.
Clinton earned a staggering $650 000 for just two appearances in two days before major gatherings in Canada by motivational speaker Tony Robbins, according to financial disclosure records filed by Clinton's wife, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton.
The filings were made public on Wednesday. As a US Senator, she is required to report her spouse's income as well as her own. Other lawmakers filings also were issued on Wednesday.
Speeches and charity work
Clinton made $7.475m in 2005, or eight times as much as he earned the prior year when he was stuck at home for long periods finishing his memoirs and recovering from heart bypass surgery. Clinton earned just $875 000 for speeches that year.
Spokesperson Jay Carson said the president had "an exceptionally busy schedule", and that paid speeches were sandwiched in around charity work on global HIV/Aids, childhood obesity, and other causes.
"Between the foundation and work on Katrina and the tsunami, paid speeches are actually a very small part of his schedule," said Carson.
Clintons millionaires many times over
Since leaving the White House in 2001, the Clintons have become millionaires many times over. The bulk of that new wealth came from his paid appearances and both Clintons' lucrative book-writing deals.
In 2005, the couple held one bank account valued between $5m and $25m, and reported the same multi-million dollar range for a separate blind trust.
The 42nd president of the United States made 42 paid appearances around the globe, and the cheapest one cost $100 000. Appearances in Abu Dhabi, Munich, and Calgary earned him $300 000 apiece, but they weren't the biggest.
Tony Robbins' Power Within motivational seminar paid him $350 000 for an October appearance in Toronto, as did Blex S.L. for an appearance in the Canary Islands. In September he received $125 000 for appearing via videoconference from New York.
Business, book dealings not revealed
While the filings offer a glimpse into the financial strength of the power couple, they do not reveal everything.
Disclosure rules do not require him to say how much he earns as a partner with Yucaipa Global Opportunities Fund, a Los Angeles-based investment firm.
He is only required to report he made more than $1 000 from Yucaipa, as with his non-employee compensation from Info USA, an Omaha-based global business database firm.
The paperwork also doesn't say how much Clinton earned last year from his book, My Life, though published reports said he inked a deal for $10m to $12m.
Last year, Senator Clinton earned $872 891 from her best-selling memoir Living History, which is on top of some $8.7m reported in prior years.
- AP
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