Newark Mayor Cory Booker pocketed 'confidential' annual payouts from law firm while in office

A New Jersey race for public office wouldn’t be complete without a little sleaze.  I think it’s required by law.

New York Post reports Cory Booker pocketed “confidential” annual payouts from his former law firm while serving as Newark mayor.

Booker, the front-runner in New Jersey’s Senate race, received five checks from the Trenk DiPasquale law firm from 2007 until 2011. During that time, the firm raked in more than $2 million in fees from local agencies over which Booker has influence.

“This was a settlement buyout for my interest in the firm,” the mayor told The Post at a campaign stop in Jersey City yesterday. “I had an equity stake, and we had a negotiated settlement.”

Booker worked at the West Orange firm for five years, leaving in 2006 when he was elected Newark’s mayor to avoid “the appearance of impropriety.”

He refused to answer how much he received in the five years after leaving.

“It’s all been disclosed for the last seven years,” Booker said.

Not quite. Booker’s state financial disclosures from 2006 to 2011 list two sources of income — the city of Newark and the law firm. The forms mandate reporting of income over $2,000 a year, but do not require an exact sum or range.

Booker’s closed lips on the earnings fly in the face of his public stances. In 2002, he released his tax returns during his unsuccessful race against incumbent Mayor Sharpe James, and ripped James for not doing the same.

The returns “provide the only clues as to how many deals the mayor is involved in . . . and the only record of the money he’s making on the side,” Booker said at the time.

When The Post asked Friday for Booker’s recent returns, his campaign refused to turn them over.

“We will release his tax returns,” said campaign spokesman Kevin Griffis, without indicating when.

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