Lawyers for Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign asked the Federal Election Commission whether an intern working for the campaign could be paid by her college rather than the campaign for the work.
The campaign not only wants DePauw University to pay the female intern for her campaign work, but it also wants the payment to be off the campaign books.
Time reports:
Clinton campaign lawyers argue that the student should be permitted to accept the $3,000 stipend and the college credit without either being designated as in-kind contributions to the campaign because the university "did not condition the availability of the stipend upon the political nature of the internship."
The campaign also argues in the request that the if the FEC rejects the school’s ability to provide a stipend, it will prevent students of less affluent backgrounds from working for campaigns in the future.
The Clinton campaign has been criticized both for its widespread use of unpaid campaign work and for its treatment of female campaign workers, who make considerably less money than male campaign workers, according to a Washington Free Beacon analysis.
The campaign has also signaled that it will pinch pennies this go around to avoid racking up debt like it did during Clinton's failed 2008 campaign. Top employees on "Clinton's cheapskate campaign" have been seen taking discount bus lines for travel between New York and Washington, D.C.
The letter to the FEC was written by the campaign's top lawyer Marc Elias, who has long been the go-to legal guy for Democratic campaigns. Elias has also done work this year for an Ohio group currently under investigation for voter fraud, which included registering multiple dead people to vote.