Democratic socialist Julia Salazar dipped into massive trust fund during campaign
Julia Salazar — the Brooklyn state senator who has been called out for falsely painting herself as a working-class immigrant — was living off a trust fund while mounting her socialist-themed campaign, new campaign finance disclosures reveal.
The fact-challenged freshman lawmaker filed papers saying the trust was worth an eye-popping $10 million — although she now claims the figure was an error and the family trust she dipped into actually holds around $400,000.
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The 28-year-old reported to the state’s Joint Commission on Public Ethics in a signed, May 15 financial disclosure that she received $18,000 in 2018 from her deceased father, Luis H. Salazar’s, trust.
In the handwritten disclosure, she appeared to value the fund at $10 million, classifying the cash stash as “Category DDDDD” — a code used in campaign paperwork to signify amounts of “$10 million or more.”
Asked about the largess on Thursday, Salazar insisted she meant to write “Category D” — a range of $5,000-$20,000 — referring to the $18,000 trust fund disbursement.
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The lawmaker said she misread the sheet provided by JCOPE outlining the categorizations — and when she read that Category DDDDD was “10,000,000 and over,” she thought it said “$10,000 and over.”
“I looked at it in a cursory way,” she told The Post, adding, “I mistook the comma versus the decimal point, so it added it extra zeros.”
Still, she managed to follow the instructions correctly on the very next line, where she reported her income working as a community organizer for Jews for Racial + Economic Justice — as “Category E,” or $20,000–$50,000.
Since she doesn’t control the trust fund, Salazar is not required to state its value on JCOPE disclosures.
The democratic socialist said she needed the inherited dough to pay her bills while she was running for office.
“The $18,000 was used to support myself, because I had to stop working in order to campaign, and I had to go on unpaid leave,” she said. “Basically seven months of living expenses on top of savings that I had from working.”
The fund, which she says currently holds less than $400,000, was cobbled together from her late father’s retirement savings, life insurance policy and real estate sales proceeds, she said.
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The senator said her aunt in Colombia controls the fund, which benefits Salazar, her brother Alex and other unnamed family members.
Court papers said the fund had “in excess” of $600,000 in 2011, according to media reports.
She resubmitted her financial disclosure to JCOPE on July 11 — noting the trust income as “Category D” — after a state worker flagged the inconsistencies to her.
Salazar made headlines in her 2018 run for the north Brooklyn district by bending the truth about her family and background.
She claimed to be a working-class immigrant — but was later revealed to have been born in the US and raised in tony Jupiter, Florida, where she even house sat for former Mets slugger Keith Hernandez.
“We were probably what you would consider upper middle class,” her own brother told New York magazine last year.
“My father was a commercial airline pilot and did well, and he had a successful business as well that he had at the same time.”
