Senate Majority Chief Chuck Schumer’s son-in-law has been employed by prime personal fairness agency Blackstone — the latest family member to land a lucrative gig with an industrial large that’s topic to authorities regulation.
Michael Shapiro, the Princeton- and Yale-educated lawyer who most not too long ago labored for the Biden administration as deputy assistant secretary for financial coverage on the Division of Transportation, has been employed as director for presidency affairs by the Wall Avenue agency.
Blackstone, which is run by billionaire businessman Stephen Schwarzman, has $880 billion in belongings underneath its administration.
Shapiro’s portfolio at Blackstone offers with infrastructure investments and initiatives.
“Mr. Shapiro is a extremely gifted particular person with deep expertise in each personal fairness infrastructure investing and public coverage, and we’re happy to have him be part of our group,” Blackstone spokesperson Matt Anderson. “He won’t be concerned in any advocacy earlier than the Majority Chief or his workplace associated to Blackstone enterprise.”
Schumer’s workplace didn’t touch upon his son-in-law’s new gig when reached by The Publish.
The corporate mentioned Shapiro is just not a registered lobbyist like his spouse, Jessica Schumer, whom he married in 2016. The 2 met in January 2011 after they had been each working on the White Home in then-President Barack Obama’s Nationwide Financial Council, according to The New York Times.
He went on to work for Hillary Clinton within the 2016 presidential marketing campaign.
Jessica Schumer is a registered lobbyist for Amazon whereas her sister, Alison Schumer, works as a product advertising and marketing supervisor at Fb.
The Schumer kids’s ties to Massive Tech have fueled some issues the Senate Majority Chief has an inherent battle of curiosity in the case of regulating highly effective firms.
The New York Democrat has been accused of transferring too slowly in bringing to the ground a vote on antitrust laws that goals to restrict the facility of firms resembling Amazon, Fb, Apple, and Google.
Throughout a current sitdown with Democratic Get together donors, Schumer mentioned that a bill co-sponsored by Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) and Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) doesn’t have enough votes to pass.
“Sen. Schumer is working with Sen. Klobuchar and different supporters to assemble the wanted votes,” Angelo Roefaro, a spokesperson for the Senate Majority Chief, instructed The Publish.
Blackstone and different personal fairness firms have been focused by Schumer’s extra progressive colleagues in Congress for tighter oversight.
Final yr, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) authored the “Cease Wall Avenue Looting Act,” which might bar personal fairness companies from forcing firms they purchase to tackle extra debt with a view to extract dividends that they might not in any other case afford.
