Guess how much US President Donald Trump’s top staff get paid
Trump defended his hiring of rich advisers such as Cohn and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross during an address to supporters last month
Some of the best-known faces in the Trump administration are also some of the best paid, according to a new list of White House salaries.
Advisers Kellyanne Conway and Stephen Bannon, along with Chief of Staff Reince Priebus and Press Secretary Sean Spicer, are among the White House employees receiving the top salary of US$179,700. Omarosa Manigault, whose title is listed as director of communications for the Office of Public Liaison, is also one of the 21 Trump aides pulling down that top salary.
Trump’s daughter Ivanka Trump and her husband, presidential adviser Jared Kushner, do not take salaries for their roles as presidential advisers, according to the list released Friday evening. The annual list is mandated by Congress.
Reed Cordish, a Baltimore developer and friend of Kushner’s who was hired to run an initiative focused on technology initiatives, is also not taking a salary for his White House work, while Gary Cohn, a former Goldman Sachs chief executive serving as Trump’s director of the National Economic Council, is being paid US$30,000
Christopher Liddell, a former top executive at Microsoft and other businesses, is also taking a US$30,000 salary for his work as a White House adviser. He and Cohn are the lowest-paid employees who receive a salary. The bottom of the scale for regular White House hires is US$40,000.
Deputy press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders is paid US$165,000, the next rung down from the top level.