No one begrudges Rep. Charles Rangel the right to a lucrative beachfront villa in the Dominican Republic – as long as he’s upfront about it.
Upfront, after all, is what the law requires.
But fresh from the disclosure that he was enjoying four rent-stabilized apartments in a Harlem luxury building – one unit of which served as a campaign office – it now appears that Rangel has been less than forthcoming about his vacation hideaway.
As The Post’s Isabel Vincent and Susan Edelman reported Sunday, financial-disclosure forms filed by Rangel over the past 20 years tell a confusing tale about the three-bedroom villa.
There are inconsistencies about just what he owns and what it’s worth; sometimes the forms list a mortgage on the property, sometimes they don’t.
But the most glaring inconsistency concerns whether – and how much -income Rangel gets from the property, which is rented to the general public when Rangel and his family aren’t in residence.
For example, the congressman’s forms show no income whatsoever for the past two years. Yet the reservations manager at the Punta Cana Hotel described Rangel’s villa to The Post as “the best casita on the beach” – one that’s “always booked solid” and is “the first one to go” between Dec. 15 and April 15, the heavy tourist season.
Rent on the Rangel villa, he said, goes for $500 to $1,100 – a night.
And owners, like Rangel, typically keep 80 percent of that.
Yet the congressman insists he has “not received any rental income.”
Unfortunately, that’s all he’ll say – maintaining that any discussion about the villa is “a private matter.”
Well, actually not.
As noted above, Rangel is legally obligated to be fully open about his financial holdings – including the full extent of any and all outside income.
Even if, as his chief-of-staff suggested, he might have re-invested any rental money.
Which gives the House Ethics Committee one more element of Rangel’s business dealings to investigate (it’s already looking into those apartments, as well as the congressman’s fund-raising for a CUNY center named in his honor).
Charlie Rangel is rapidly becoming the poster child for congressional sleaze.
If he’s as blameless as he claims, he should simply start answering some obviously legitimate questions, instead of hiding behind his “none of your business” belligerence.