Rep. Stark will pay taxes on Calif. residence

Rep. Pete Stark (D-Calif.) said this weekend he will pay taxes on his California residence after having declared his Maryland residence as his primary home.

“Congress is typically in session more than 18o days a year and I have to live somewhere when I’m back in Washington,” Stark said, as reported by the San Francisco Chronicle. “I’ve done nothing illegal, but now that it looks like I’m going to be ineligible for the credit, I’ll just pay the higher taxes.”

California law presumes representatives’ residence to be where they are registered to vote (Stark’s in-laws’ home, in this case), but Republicans had criticized him for having claimed Maryland on his taxes while representing California in Congress.

“The Republicans put out the story and it made the rounds there,” Stark said. “But we’ve maybe had a half a dozen calls at our office, including one from Reno and a couple from Southern California.”