That's How Much Lawyers in the White House Make

Lawyers who work in the White House don't talk much, but they can't avoid having their salaries reported to Congress.

The Obama administration, complying with an annual congressional requirement, has released salary information for all those working in the White House, including more than 40 lawyers in the White House Counsel’s Office and other legal jobs. Click here for the full report and here (pdf) for a list with just legal staff.

White House Counsel Gregory Craig tops the list, naturally, at $172,200. By comparison, the former partner at Williams & Connolly made $1.7 million last year, according to a disclosure report released in April.

Below Craig, three people with the title of deputy White House counsel come in at $158,500: Daniel Meltzer, a longtime Harvard Law professor who is principal deputy; Cassandra Butts, a former vice president at the liberal Center for American Progress; and Mary DeRosa, deputy counsel for national security who previously worked on the Senate Judiciary Committee.

The list includes 12 people with the title of associate White House counsel, at a salary of $130,500. It also includes several detailees from other federal agencies. Virginia Canter, for example, detailed from the Treasury Department, is listed at $163,940.

Most of the salaries are the same as those paid to Bush administration lawyers a year ago. In January, President Barack Obama announced a pay freeze for those in the White House making more than $100,000 a year.

Comments

[DC Wilson]

The more telling figures probably are what they made last year and years prior, as well as what they can expect to make afterwards. All of those figures dwarf the current salary and indicate they generally could afford to take a temporary pay cut while they wait for an inevitable astromnomical pay raise. And what better way to do it than holding what are undeniably some of the highest powered positions in the law. Yeah, tough break.