The United Auto Workers (UAW), the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), and other groups plan to file an ethics complaint against Mitt Romney for allegedly failing to disclose his profits from the auto bailout, the UAW has told The Huffington Post.
The groups are calling for an investigation by the U.S. Office of Government Ethics to investigate Romney's alleged violation of the Ethics in Government Act, which requires presidential candidates to disclose their personal finances. The ethics complaint comes on the heels of an Oct. 17 article in The Nation, which alleged that Romney has hidden his personal gains of at least $15.3 million from the auto bailout.
"He made his fortune off the misfortune of others," Bob King, president of the UAW, told The Huffington Post on Wednesday. "Why should we have to find out from the media about this?"
The Romney campaign could not be immediately reached for comment.
The allegations are ironic given that Romney has been a staunch critic of the auto bailout. Romney called for the government to let the auto industry go bankrupt in an op-ed in The New York Times in 2008. The Romney campaign also released a misleading ad in October that implies Chrysler has moved production of Jeeps to China following the auto bailout.
Romney and his wife allegedly made millions from the auto bailout through their investments in the hedge fund Elliott Management, which held a stake in the auto bailout recipient Delphi Automotive, according to The Nation. The return on this investment amounted to more than 3,000 percent, according to The Nation.
That said, the magazine didn't say that Romney broke the law. From The Nation:
In their 2011 and 2012 Federal Financial Disclosure filing, Ann Romney’s trust lists “more than $1 million” invested with Elliott. This is the description for all of her big investments—the minimal disclosure required by law.
The UAW is holding a press conference on the planned ethics complaint at 2 p.m. on Thursday in Toledo, Ohio.
CLARIFICATION: Language has been changed to characterize more specifically the claims regarding Jeep made in Romney's ad.
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