The News Journal has obviously been poking around DL again. They wrote an article about DD’s post on Michelle Rollins “Millionaire Michelle Rollins Takes Bonus From Wilmington Trust TARP Funds.” The News Journal represents this as a partisan attack but also admits that the post is accurate.
The numbers being tossed around at DelawareLiberal are accurate. In 2008, according to the bank’s proxy statement, Rollins had a total compensation of $20,470. In 2009 — even as the bank was holding $330 million in government TARP money — her compensation soared to $92,991.
The jump in compensation took her from the third-highest-paid director in 2008 to No. 1 in 2009. The critics fail to note, however, that Rollins wasn’t the only director to see more — compensation levels were raised across the board for 2009.
Still, it seems perfect fodder for a political season — and something that has prompted one anonymous DelawareLiberal blogger to vow they would close out their Wilmington Trust account, ASAP.
This statement – The critics fail to note, however, that Rollins wasn’t the only director to see more — compensation levels were raised across the board for 2009 – does not absolve Rollins in this matter. It sounds like what Wilmington Trust did is take the TARP money and then reward themselves for doing such a bad job managing other people’s money. The fact that Wilmington Trust has not repaid the TARP money shows WT needed the money to function.
If the Republicans nominate Michelle Rollins for the DE-AL seat, just remember that Republicans have taken TARP off the table as an issue (even though TARP happened under Bush). Michelle Rollins loves her TARP money.