FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

October 25, 2006 

Contact: Jessica Rhoades 406/442-9520 

Video: Despite $165,000 salary, Burns tells kids his money "doesn't last all that long"

Burns doesn't get it when it comes to finances at home or in Washington

(HELENA, Mont.) – A new video posted on YouTube shows Sen. Conrad Burns joking about  a conversation he had with a sixth-grader in Libby, Mont.

In the video, Sen. Burns describes his recent conversation with children about his salary, in a city where nearly 23% of sixth-graders live under the poverty line.

"Usually the second question is, 'how much money do you make?' and you tell 'em and they go, 'whoah,'" Burns tells an audience in Libby. "'That sounds like a lot.' I said, 'Yeah but what you have one of I have to have two of, and there's a $1,200 round trip airline ticket between 'em, so it doesn't last all that long."

"This video just proves how out-of-touch Sen. Burns is with Montana," said Jim Farrell, Executive Director of the Montana Democratic Party. "The per capita income in Libby averages just over $13,000 a year.  And Sen. Burns has to explain why his $165,000 per year salary doesn't last all that long."

Sen. Conrad Burns has never considered his finances at home or in Washington a priority, records show.

Under Sen. Burns' watch, the national debt has nearly tripled. In 1989, Burns' first year in office, the national debt was $2.85 trillion. Experts say that figure will balloon to more than $8.6 trillion by the end of this year.  Every single American would have to pay nearly $30,000 in order to pay off the national debt.  And Sen. Burns has voted to raise the national debt limit at least five times.

But clearly, he isn't--and never really has been--concerned with paying off debt.

Records show Sen. Burns defaulted on nearly $200,000 in loans after he began his broadcast radio business in 1975.

In describing his former career as a broadcaster to the Billings Gazette earlier this month, Burns said, "I went so stone broke that I was praying for identity theft."

Sen. Burns failed to pay back some of his loans for 13 years – even with a U.S. Senator's six-digit salary.  Between 1979 and 1982, his failure to pay his bills resulted at least three different lawsuits:

• Oct. 16, 1979: $59,285 default on contractual agreement with United Press International
• Dec. 12, 1979: $110,000 default on Small Business Administration Loan
• Aug. 31, 1982: $72,000 default on loan

But the problems didn't go away.  In 2001 a creditor who loaned Burns money back in the 1970s was forced to sue Burns for more than $134,500 in unpaid debt and interest. [Complaint, Holeman v. Burns, 9/18/01]

"Let's face it, Sen. Conrad Burns is a mess when it comes to keeping track of money – his own and the taxpayers’," Farrell said. "It's time send him home, where he can figure out how to take care of his own finances without making the rest of the country pay for his out-of-control spending habits."

Farrell highlighted the record of Burns' opponent, Montana Senate President Jon Tester.  Under Tester's leadership, the Montana Legislature balanced the state budget on time without raising taxes, Farrell noted.  At the same time, the legislature eliminated taxes on 13,000 small businesses.

Watch the YouTube video online here.