Democrat Rep. Katie Porter (D-CA) continues to live in an Orange County home she purchased far below market price with the help of the University of California Irvine (UCI), despite not meeting eligibility requirements for nearly four years.
Although houses in California’s Orange County sell for $1 million or more, Porter purchased her home for $523,000 in 2011, a price far below market value, as part of UCI’s program designed to court academics who otherwise could not “afford to live in the affluent area.”
However, UCI’s deal with Porter required her to continue her service as a full-time faculty member at the law school, otherwise, she would be required to pay her mortgage within months under the agreement’s enforcement provision.
“Your primary duties, of course, will be to serve as a professor of law. It is expected that you will teach two classes … you will be expected to hold office hours and be available to mentor students,” UCI officials wrote in a letter signed by Porter at the end of 2010.
Porter, whose net worth is estimated to be as high as $2 million, has failed to fulfill her end of the bargain since being elected to Congress in 2018.
Porter is likely able to keep her subsidized housing under the guise of being on unpaid leave while she holds office.
UCI spokesman Tom Vasich said that faculty “on approved leaves without pay remain UCI employees, and they can maintain their home in University Hills.”
However, emails by the Associated Press showed that UCI law school’s vice dean Chris Whytock, who donated to Porter’s first congressional campaign, made the case to other faculty members to extend Porter’s sweetheart housing agreement.
After donating to Porter’s 2018 campaign, Whytock wrote a memo in 2020 suggesting Porter’s housing arrangement with the school could continue indefinitely.
“Is there any fixed limit on the number of years of leave without pay … One of our administrators mentioned that they seemed to recall a two-year limit,” Whytock wrote. “Some government service may, of course, last for a number of years.”
However, Porter’s team told the Associated Press the California congresswoman “had no knowledge of Vice Dean Chris Whytock’s role in researching her request for leave” and “at no point” was in contact with him about it.
Although the housing agreement is not illegal, some have questioned the ethics surrounding it, primarily because Porter has characterized the American political system as one that allows “the wealthy and well-connected” to “live in one reality while the rest of us live in another.”
Additionally, the Federal Election Commission (FEC) prohibits third parties from paying federal candidates living expenses.
Capital University Law School professor Bradley A. Smith said Porter’s deal with UCI “sounds like the sort of insider deal that really makes people mad at Congress.”
“Let’s suppose they were paying her mortgage? I think that would pretty clearly be a problem. Here, it is a little different than that. They are just letting her keep a deal that she had previously,” Smith told the Associated Press. “But it does seem to subsidize her income. If I were still serving on the commission and that complaint came in, I’d be very interested in seeing her response.”
“She has a reputation for being highly ethical and requiring others to live up to that standard,” Washington lobbyist Craig Holman said. “Let’s hope she is not running short of her own ethics with the university.”
Despite these concerns, Porter maintained that she “followed the applicable (University of California) policies, as well as all applicable state and federal law.”
Jordan Dixon-Hamilton is a reporter for Breitbart News. Write to him at jdixonhamilton@breitbart.com or follow him on Twitter.
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