Democrats Hit for Paying Minority Staffers Less Than Whites

An embarrassing study shows that Democrat political candidates pay their minority campaign staffers less than they pay their white staffers.

The study finds that minority Democrat campaign staffers routinely get paid less than their white counterparts. Further, fewer minorities than whites are even hired in the first place, and the minorities that are hired feel they are pigeonholed as “minority outreach” operatives instead of normal members of the campaign.

The study found that minority campaign staffers were paid 70 cents to the dollar of their white co-workers.

In an article at the Daily Beast, Democrat political operative Jamal Simmons said, “Most minority staffers get hired in campaigns in field jobs, and field jobs pay less. The problem is: they don’t hire African Americans, Latinos in the parts of the campaigns where they spend the most money. The most money in campaigns is spent in communications, polling and data. In those parts of the campaign, it’s very much mostly white.”

Another noted that even if a minority staffer is hired, they get stuck in the low paying “community outreach” jobs. “As a person of color [at the start of your career], you’re always put in situations where a primary part of your job is communicating with or working with other people of color.”

“There’s a presumption that minorities can’t manage ‘white’ issues. There’s a presumption that white voters won’t like to see a black press secretary, or that white voters won’t want to see an African-American or Latino political director,” Simmons told Daily Beast. “There’s just a general prejudice factor,” he said.

For years, President Obama has pushed the claim that women are paid only 76 cents to the dollar that men are paid. This claim is, of course, entirely untrue, but it does make for a good liberal talking point.

But despite the rhetoric, this study finds that Democrats pay minority staffers less than white staffers, even in violation of Obama’s favorite equal pay act, the Lilly Ledbetter Act.

Follow Warner Todd Huston on Twitter @warnerthuston or email the author at igcolonel@hotmail.com.