Like most Americans with health insurance, members of Congress Rep. Valdez “Val” Demings (D) and Senator Marco Rubio (R) who are paid a yearly salary of $174,000, have to pay their healthcare premiums out of their own pockets.
Sen. Rubio and Rep. Demings, who are running against one another in the 2022 U.S. Senate race in Florida, don’t necessarily have to pay their monthly healthcare premiums or any other smaller premiums that require payment from their own pockets, they can use their campaign accounts to pay for them, we think.
As of now, candidates can not pay their salaries or health care costs with campaign dollars, but that could soon change according to a story on opensecrets.org. According to the post, the FEC is considering allowing candidates to use their money raise to pay for a trip to the doctor.
That’s exactly what Rep. Demings appears to have done according to her 2022 campaign FEC filings.
In the filings, Demings made (5) $183.00 campaign payments to Florida Blue Dental and RBSM Premium & Benefit for "Dental Insurance" and "Health Insurance" respectively.
Prior filings show that Demings’ campaign paid smaller healthcare and dental premiums as well.
But unlike her colleague in the House of Representatives, Rep. Eric Swalwell (D), Demings hasn’t made any lavish or questionable expenditures outside of a $1,500 Pizza purchase in October 2019 and $1,325 being spent at the Lansdown Resort in Virginia.
Now, there is the possibility that the Demings campaign paid for employee healthcare premiums or partly contributed to the premiums, or is simply paying for all or part of her healthcare premiums with campaign dollars. We just don't know.
We reached out to both the Demings campaign and the official legislative office for comment but have not received a response back.
Sen. Rubio's FEC filings show a lot of money going to consultants and fundraising, but nothing has been paid out to anything that could be seen as a personal expense.
Senator Rubio, who has held his seat since 2011 and has even run for president in 2016, has raised more than double what the Demings senatorial campaign has reported during the 2022 election cycle. Rubio reported having raised $13,123,769.55, while Demings has raised $5,031,896.95. Equivalent to roughly 2.6 times the resources.
