A filthy rich professor at the University of Pennsylvania’s famed Wharton School of Business donated $75,000 to the Democratic National Committee expressly for the 2016 Democratic convention — and over $108,000 to Democrats in all — because he opposes Donald Trump and is deeply concerned that income inequality and “extreme” political donations threaten the American social fabric.
The adjunct associate professor is Eric Schoenberg, reports The Daily Pennsylvanian, the Ivy League school’s campus newspaper.
Schoenberg made his very generous $75,000 donation for this week’s Democratic National Committee in Philadelphia by way of a wire transfer in May.
The fat cat professor’s contribution was disclosed when Wikileaks dumped nearly 20,000 emails last week. Wikileaks says the emails are from the accounts of Democratic National Committee officials.
“I think Donald Trump is a potential disaster and I’m going to do everything I can to make sure he isn’t president,” Schoenberg told The Daily Pennsylvanian. “Trump represents a true threat to our democracy and our system of government.”
Schoenberg, who is slated to teache a Wharton course on family wealth this fall, “substantially increased” his political contributions this year — by more than 718 percent, in fact — because he wants to defeat Trump.
He admitted that his extravagant donation to the Democratic National Committee is dramatically at odds with his conviction that the government should stifle the political speech of Americans by limiting their campaign donations.
“I would dearly love to reform the system so people aren’t able to give extreme amounts of money to parties and candidates,” Schoenberg told The Daily Pennsylvanian. At the same time, he rationalized, “it makes no sense to unilaterally disarm.”
Schoenberg’s salary at the private university is not available. A typical, full associate professor at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School brings home an average yearly salary of $159,297, according to StartClass.com, an education research website.
Such an annual salary would put Schoenberg’s income in the top 2 percent of all Americans.
The income Schoenberg derives from his faculty position at Wharton teaching at Wharton is small potatoes, though, compared to his freakishly high net worth.
Schoenberg is a member of the advisory board of Patriotic Millionaires, “a group of more than 200 individuals with annual incomes over $1 million and/or assets over $5 million who are committed to raising the minimum wage, combatting [sic] the influence of big money in politics, and advancing a progressive tax structure.”
He is also the chairman of the board at CampusWorks, Inc. He was previously the managing director at “a boutique investment bank.”
“I now earn far more money from my financial portfolio than from my job as an Adjunct Professor, and as a result I consistently pay under 15% of my income to the IRS,” Schoenberg wrote in a 2011 op-ed in The Huffington Post complaining that he doesn’t pay sufficiently high taxes.
In addition to his $75,000 gift to the Democratic National Committee this year, Schoenberg has reportedly donated over $33,000 to Democrats in 2016.
He apparently made the lavish $75,000 contribution when he attended a New York fundraiser at BuzzFeed chairman Kenneth Lerer’s residence. President Barack Obama made an appearance at the event. (RELATED: BuzzFeed Falls For Fake Lawsuit Alleging That Obama Forced Cliven Bundy To Perform Oral Sex On Dogs)
The May 13 email outing Schoenberg’s hefty donation was from DNC national finance director Jordan Kaplan. “Why did they give 75?” Kaplan asked, according to The Daily Pennsylvanian. (The word “they” refers to both Schoenberg and his wife, Alexandra.)
“Convention,” DNC finance chairman Zachary Allen answered.
Trump attended the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, graduating in 1968 with an undergraduate degree in economics — after transferring from Fordham University.
The GOP presidential nominee frequently boasts about his two years as a Wharton student.
“Hey, look, I went to the hardest school to get into — the best school in the world,” Trump said on CNN last year, for example.
“I guess you could say the Wharton School of Finance. It’s like super genius stuff. I came out. I built a tremendous company. I had tremendous success. The ‘Art of the Deal,’ ‘The Apprentice,’ everything,” Trump further blustered.
Also last year, Trump defended a comment about Fox News journalist Megyn Kelly “having blood coming out of her wherever” by saying: “I went to the Wharton School of Finance. I was an excellent student. I’m a smart person.” (RELATED: Trump On Megyn Kelly Blood Comment: ‘Only A Sick Person Would Even Think About It’)
Despite Trump’s numerous assertions that he attended Penn’s Wharton school, officials at the Ivy League bastion have almost completely snubbed him. (RELATED: Trump’s Ivy League Alma Mater Treats Him Like A Red-Headed Stepchild)
An open letter signed — currently — by 3,694 “deeply disappointed” Wharton alumni, professors and students denounces Trump for his “insistence on exclusion and scapegoating” and calls Trump’s behavior “bad for business and bad for the American economy.”
Follow Eric on Twitter. Like Eric on Facebook. Send education-related story tips to erico@dailycaller.com.
