When Karen Carter Peterson’s father died in 2018, he left an estate valued at more than $6.2 million, half of which went to his wife and the remaining $3.1 million to be divided equally between Sen. Peterson and her two sisters.
That meant she was an instant millionaire.
Still, she found it necessary to rip off state taxpayers for nearly $15,000 in per diem payments at $161 per day for 20 of the 24-day session in 2020 that she did not attend ($13, 685 in per diem, plus another $1,225.90 in mileage). That was in addition to her $22,800 base salary as a member of the Louisiana Legislature.
Back in 2012, when she was elected State Democratic Party Chairperson, she proceeded to stack the State Democratic Executive Committee with her own appointees and then prevailed on her friendly committee to approve an ANNUAL STIPEND of $36,000, plus expenses (It might be interesting to know if she charged mileage to both the state Democratic Party and to the state of Louisiana when she traveled to Baton Rouge on legislative/party business).
Even then she wasn’t finished. Her sister Eileen Carter of Houma was paid $13,000 during October and November 2015 for “organizational/grassroots consultation” ($1500 per week, or a per-annum rate of $78,000).
Given all that, it seems fair to compare Carter Peterson to the owner of a five-star restaurant like say, Antoine’s of New Orleans, going from table to table grabbing the tips intended for the wait staff (of course, it goes without saying that the owner of Antoine’s would never pull a stunt so crass – but the same might not apply, apparently, to Carter Peterson). Considering Louisiana’s abysmal poverty rate, it somehow conjures up images of a rich merchant sweeping crumbs from the outstretched hands of a starving peasant.
She also appointed Stephen Handwerk as Executive Director of the State Democratic Party at a salary of almost $100,000.
But, to be fair, let’s take a closer look at Carter Peterson’s leadership, her sister’s work at “organizational/grassroots consultation” and Handwerk’s performance at identifying and engaging Democratic voters in the state.
Taking the latter first, Handwerk was somewhat reluctant to make use of an available database to perform his job, claiming that he had insufficient staff to perform the task. Yet, he somehow found the time to take a second salaried job with the Democratic National Committee.
Eileen Carter? Well, we just don’t know what the hell she did to earn $13,000 in two months.
But as for Carter Peterson herself, well, in 2017, she managed to get herself elected to the DNC as Vice Chair of Civic Engagement and Voter Participation even as the Louisiana Democratic Party was bleeding membership.
Mark Ballard, writing for the BATON ROUGE ADVOCATE last July, said, “…on Peterson’s watch the number of registered Democrats, who once dominated electoral politics in Louisiana, declined about 10%, losing 148,834 voters to total 1.25 million Democrats as of July.”
The number of Republicans, Ballard said, grew by 20% to 948,850 during her eight years as state Democratic Party chair.
Of course, much of that shift in both directions can be attributed to the trend, especially in the South, of Republican growth and Democratic losses. Still, for someone hired specifically for civic engagement and voter participation, her performance has to be considered disappointing at best and inept at worst. You simply cannot grow interest in any endeavor if you don’t get your message out – and the message from the Louisiana Democratic Party has been one of utter silence. You’d think the state Democratic offices would be a hive of activity, pandemic or no pandemic, during the recent presidential campaign. Instead, a visit to the Baton Rouge headquarters in the midst of the campaign found the place locked and vacant.
At least part of the reason for that must certainly be attributed to her lack of leadership.
“But the biggest concern to several Democratic Parish Executive Committee (DPEC) members,” LouisianaVoice SAID in November 2017, “is the lack of membership on no fewer than 29 parish executive committees, a condition critics attribute to Peterson’s lack of timely appointments.
“There are 29 parishes which have five or fewer members on their committee,” one DPEC member said. “There should be at least 15 members of each parish executive committee. That’s nearly half the state that has non-existent or non-functioning DPECs. Livingston Parish has only seven of 15 seats filled. One member of the Livingston DPEC has been working since February to get the seats filled but that still hasn’t been done even though names have been submitted.”
And nearly two years into Peterson’s second term as state chairperson, there were still 33 Democratic State Central Committee (DSCC) vacancies. “If she fills positions at all, it’s usually with her minions,” one DSCC member said.
So, now Peterson is presenting herself as the best-qualified candidate to succeed the departed Cedric Richmond as U.S. Representative from Louisiana’s 2nd District.
Given her performances as state Democratic chair and DNC vice chair of civic engagement and voter participation, her torpedoing of gubernatorial appointments, her only occasional appearances at her legislative job while still being paid for non-attendance, the nepotism and favoritism in her hiring and the shrinking of the state Democratic Party under her leadership, it would be a pretty good stretch for her to be considered as the best the 2nd District has to offer.
In fact, it’s difficult to see her as the best at anything other than looking out for Karen Carter Peterson.
I’m very confused about why KCP is considered “progressive” nationally? Is it just being pro-choice?
Wow and I thought I was pushing the envelope or say “over the top” with my almost rant comment for your last post concerning Ms Peterson….Thanks I feel almost vindicated at least justified.
This is a great example of a big reason Dems have been losing ground. Big-money, elite Republicans do better with their jive populism while people are turned off by so many big money, elite Democrats like Peterson. It’s an unfair double standard, but it seems to hurt Democrats more. Not every great Democratic politician has to be from a humble background, but examples of this kind of privilege and corruption are detrimental to the grassroots support we badly need to stop the rise of essentially a neo-fascist GOP.
What’s a neo-fascist and how is one different from a regular fascist?
They’re just revivals of old (regular) fascist. One as detestable as the other.
OK, is the other Democrat candidate any better? Time for research!!
I just check the list of candidates….8 Democrats out of 15 and she had the best name recognition, of course. Work to do.
Tom, I am not defending Karen, but you need to blame the legislature’s interpretation of the per diem statute. The statute provides that they are entitled to the per diem for “attendance” of the session. The powers that be interpret that to mean that as long as they are in session the members are entitled to the per diem, even if they are not in attendance for floor action. Remember in 2020, the pandemic caused the legislature to go into recess. The members were back home, but were still earning their per diem.
Edith, it will be interesting to see what the 2nd congressional district will look like after reapportionment. The current district is drawn to heavily favor the voters and candidates from New Orleans. The district snakes along the river from Orleans Parish to EBR parish.
Yep, they even get per diem for Saturdays and Sundays (and Fridays for the senators) that they don’t even meet. That needs to be corrected and they need to enact rules that you don’t collect if you don’t attend – but the Louisiana Legislature will never, never, never pass such a rule.
Way back a long time ago when ethics mattered….wasn’t it the rule that no elected body could vote themselves raises, perks, etc. These votes had to be in the future so as to NOT favor the ones that passed the favors? Since ALL of our elected bodies seem to be able to just vote themselves anything their hearts desire, they will surely do this. Correct me if I am wrong about the waiting period for going into effect.
Very interesting article, but I note that this is nothing new. It is hard to compete moneywise with the GOP, plus they have the evangelicals to storm capitol. Mike Pence is promoting election security, knowing the real money is on redistricting or gerrymandering. We must watch the numbers and see what happens to HR1 and the independent commission oversight. I digress, but remember the book about the GOP “rat f**king ” the election……ron thompson
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[…] receipt of the per diem despite her absence was first flagged by Tom Aswell, a former reporter who publishes Louisiana Voice, a political blog. He reported that […]
This was a lovely blog post