Bernie Sanders: Financial Transparency for Thee���.Not So Much for Me

Now that Sen. Bernie Sanders��� campaign, one built largely on demanding financial accountability from other politicians as well as from ���the system,��� more generally, is over, it turns out that financial disclosure reports he was required to file as a candidate will remain entirely unfiled.

You see, Sanders was mandated by federal law to disclose the most recent status of his personal financial profile in mid-May, but he filed for, and received, a 45-day extension of that due date. Then came June 30, at which time he asked for, and received, another extension from the Federal Election Commission.

On July 12, Sanders endorsed Hillary Clinton, and, as the month drew to a close, Clinton accepted the nomination of the Democratic Party for president. The Sanders campaign was no more, and so, too, went away the requirement for Sanders to make his financial disclosures. As Sanders spokesman Michael Briggs told the Center for Public Integrity earlier this week, ������since the senator no longer is a candidate there was no requirement to file.���

Well, that seems convenient.

While it is tough to imagine the electorate getting terribly worked up over the lack of financial disclosure on the part of a candidate who has zero chance of occupying the White House, Sanders��� case is a bit different. That a self-described socialist, who made the issue of financial integrity the most resonant theme of his campaign, goes out of his way to avoid making personal financial disclosures at the very time when mountains of money were pouring in to his campaign, seems more than a little peculiar. Making things even more curious is the recent revelation that the socialist senator plunked down roughly $600,000 on a summer home just after his campaign ended.

Perhaps the web cast by ���the system��� really is so great that even a well-intentioned socialist like grandfatherly Bernie Sanders can���t help but get caught in it. You���d sure like to think otherwise, but if everything is as it should be, where are the disclosures? After all, while Sanders may no longer be required to make them, surely an honorable, all-for-transparency socialist like himself would be eager to follow through on them, anyway.

Wouldn���t he?

By Robert G. Yetman, Jr. Editor At Large