Oof! Rep. Jason Chaffetz has opened up a real can of worms with his comments suggesting Americans should stop buying iPhones in favor of healthcare.
You’ll remember that Chaffetz said on CNN’s New Day on Tuesday morning that Americans should invest in their own healthcare instead of buying a new iPhone. He later walked back those comments.
Turns out that Chaffetz loves spending money at the Apple Store himself. Spin Magazine looked through his campaign finance disclosure reports and found that someone from the “Friends of Jason Chaffetz” campaign committee spent $738.08 at the Apple Store last July.
But there’s another layer of hypocrisy to the congressman’s statements. As noted by The Intercept’s Lee Fang, FEC filings to show that Chaffetz’s donors not only pay his campaign’s Verizon bills– which last year ranged between $400 and $515 each month–but also, on at least one occasion, for his Apple electronics. On July 15, 2016, Chaffetz, or someone from his office, spent a total of $775.04 in two purchases (one for $738.08 and another for $36.96) at an Apple Store in Salt Lake City using funds from the Friends of Jason Chaffetz committee. That would be enough to purchase a new iPhone 6S and a case.
The totals are even higher if you go back a few years. The New York Daily Newsreports that since 2014 the Friends of Jason Chaffetz committee has filed more than 20 expenditures for Verizon Wireless for a total of $11,021. $704 more was spent by the committee on two iPads in 2015, in addition to over $3,000 at Apple Stores.
Not a good look at all.
