What is Cory Booker's Net Worth and Salary?
Cory Booker is an American politician and lawyer who has a net worth of $3 million. Cory Booker is best known for being a US senator from New Jersey, a position he was elected to in 2013. He became the first black U.S. Senator from New Jersey in 2013 when he won the general election after Frank Lautenberg passed away in office. Prior to this, he was the mayor of Newark from 2006 to 2013. Booker ran for the Democratic nomination in the 2020 presidential election, ultimately losing to Joe Biden.
Salary and Book Royalties
Outside of his $174,000 Senate salary, Cory Booker has earned a little over $1 million in royalties from his book "United." He earned $325,000 in royalties in 2016 and and $400,000 in 2015. According to his 2017 wealth disclosure, Cory reported $550,000 in assets, mostly in brokerage accounts.
Finances and Tax Returns
According to his tax returns, between 1998 and 2013 Cory earned a total of $4 million before taxes. He paid $1,057,359 worth of taxes during that period. His total earnings from speeches between 2000 and today, top $2 million before taxes. During that same time period he has given more than $400,000 to charity.
Early Life and Education
Cory Booker was born on April 27, 1969 in Washington, DC to Carolyn and IBM executive Cary, and was brought up in Harrington Park, New Jersey. Raised in a religious household, he attended a small African Methodist Episcopal Church with his family. As a teen, Booker went to Northern Valley Regional High School at Old Tappan, where he was on the varsity football team. He went on to attend Stanford University, from which he graduated with a BA in political science and later an MA in sociology. At Stanford, Booker also played as a tight end on the Cardinal football team. Due to his academic excellence, he earned a Rhodes Scholarship to study at Queen's College at the University of Oxford; from the institution, he received a degree in US history. Booker went on to obtain his JD from Yale Law School in 1997.
Career Beginnings
Following his graduation from law school, Booker worked as staff attorney for New York's Urban Justice Center and program coordinator for the Newark Youth Project. He subsequently entered politics in 1998 when he won a seat on the Municipal Council of Newark in an upset victory over incumbent George Branch. In this position, Booker called attention to the problems of drug dealing, violence, and unequal urban development in the city by embarking on a 10-day hunger strike and living in a tent and motor home.
Mayor of Newark
Instead of running for reelection for the Municipal Council, Booker decided to run for mayor of Newark in 2002. Ultimately, he lost in the election to incumbent Sharpe James. Booker chose to run again in 2006, this time winning against Ronald Rice. He was later reelected in 2010. During his tenure as mayor, Booker led efforts to reduce Newark's crime rate and improve its services and infrastructure. Notably, crime decreased substantially under his mayoralty. Among his other successful actions, Booker doubled affordable housing under development and quadrupled affordable housing under predevelopment. He also helped reduce the city budget deficit by over $100 million.
During his first term as mayor, Booker launched the Let's Move! Newark program as part of Michelle Obama's Let's Move! initiative to combat childhood obesity. Booker expanded his program in his second term. Also during his second term, he rescued a woman from a house fire and saved a dog from freezing temperatures.
US Senator
After US senator from New Jersey Frank Lautenberg passed away in June of 2013, Booker announced his candidacy for Lautenberg's seat. He ended up winning the special election in October, in the process becoming the first African-American to be elected senator since Obama in 2004, and the first from New Jersey. Subsequently, in the 2014 general election, Booker defeated Republican Jeff Bell. He was reelected in 2020, beating Rik Mehta.
In his tenure in the US Senate, Booker has sponsored, written, and passed legislation focused on numerous progressive issues. The legislation has helped advance such causes as same-sex marriage, women's rights, and universal healthcare. Additionally, Booker has promoted economic reforms to ameliorate income inequality, particularly as it pertains to the harmful effects of the wealth gap on racial minorities. Among his other focuses, he has pushed to fight climate change, reform national immigration policy and the criminal justice system, and increase diplomacy in the Middle East.
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2020 Presidential Election
In early 2019, Booker announced his candidacy for the Democratic nomination in the 2020 presidential election. He went on to participate in the first five Democratic presidential debates, but failed to meet the polling eligibility requirements for the sixth debate. Consequently, Booker dropped out of the race in early 2020.
Other Endeavors
Beyond the Senate, Booker serves on the board of advisers of Democrats for Education Reform, a political action committee based in New York. He's also a member of the board of trustees of Columbia University's Teachers College. In 2012, Booker formed the video-sharing technology company Waywire with tech executives Nathan Richardson and Sarah Ross; he resigned from its board upon his election as senator in 2013.
Booker has been especially visible in the media. Notably, he was the subject of the Oscar-nominated 2005 documentary film "Street Fight," which documented his first mayoral campaign. In 2009, Booker began starring on the documentary television series "Brick City," which centers on his work improving the city of Newark. The show won a Peabody Award. Booker also appeared in the 2011 documentary film "Miss Representation."
Personal Life
Booker has never married, although he has had romantic relationships with author Cleo Wade and actress Rosario Dawson.
Booker lives in a townhouse in the trendy Lincoln Park neighborhood of Newark, New Jersey. Earlier, from 1998 to 2006, he resided in the Brick Towers affordable housing complex in Newark's Central Ward, and subsequently lived in a three-story rental in the South Ward.
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