Editor’s Note: Enough talk from the Democrats about identifying with the working class. Every one of these candidates are multi-millionaires, part of the 1% they so enthusiastically despise. So Bernie and Elizabeth, you might want to change your narrative and get real. Running for office and getting elected makes you pretty darn rich (especially with all those special congressional benefits).
By Dan Alexander, Chase Peterson-Withorn and Michela Tindera
Everyone knows Donald Trump is rich. But how about the 25 people jockeying to replace him as president? Forbes dug into the details—examining financial disclosure statements, scouring local real estate records and calculating pension benefits—to figure out the finances of the 2020 candidates.
There were some surprises. Bernie is a millionaire. So is “middle-class Joe” Biden. Elizabeth Warren is richer than both of them, worth an estimated $12 million. But she’s a long way from John Delaney, whose $200 million fortune makes him twice as wealthy as every other Democratic candidate not named Tom Steyer. The hedge fund tycoon, who announced his candidacy in July 2019, is worth an estimated $1.6 billion.
Aside from Trump and Steyer, the average net worth is $12.9 million—the same as it was for the 2016 contenders. The median net worth is $2 million. The poorest is Pete Buttigieg, who has an estimated $100,000—or about 0.003% of Trump’s fortune.
We reached out to all of the candidates. No one, not even the Democrats who spend the most time bashing Trump for his financial dealings, answered every question. So we ranked the entire field on transparency, assigning scores ranging from 0 (lips sealed) to 5 (full disclosure). In the end, we uncovered the money, regardless of whether the candidates wanted it out in the open.