Designer Aurora James called her “Tax the Rich” dress for Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez a “powerful message” — but it’s not one she has taken to heart.
The 37-year-old fashionista who made waves at the Met Gala with Democratic-Socialist AOC last week is a notorious tax deadbeat with unpaid debts dogging her in multiple states, records show.
Most of luxe-living James’ arrears center on Cultural Brokerage Agency, an LLC she formed in 2011 to serve as the parent company of her fashion brand, which today is known as Brother Vellies. It’s a favorite of people like Beyoncé, Rihanna, and Meghan Markle.
The company racked up three open tax warrants in New York state for failing to withhold income taxes from employees’ paychecks totaling $14,798, the state Department of Taxation and Finance told The Post. The debts — which were incurred before the pandemic — stem from 2018 and 2019. The company has been hit with 15 warrants in total since 2015.
Front page of the New York Post on Sept. 19, 2021.
The company got into a deeper hole with the feds. Between April 2018 and April 2019, the Internal Revenue Service placed six federal liens on Cultural Brokerage Agency totaling $103,220. The liens specifically cite the company’s failure to remit employee payroll taxes.
The IRS declined to comment on their current status.
“Just because they take it out of your paycheck doesn’t mean they’re sending it to the government,” David Cenedella, a Baruch College taxation lecturer explained after reviewing the liens. “It’s certainly not something you want. I would not say your average business out there has this. Something went wrong.”
Aurora James owes $2,504 in property taxes on this home.
While James apparently has no problem stiffing the Taxman, she isn’t shy about taking money from taxpayers — her company received in $41,666 in pandemic relief aid.
Over the years Cultural Brokerage Agency has also faced multiple legal challenges as a result of habitual nonpayment of worker benefits.
In October 2019 the state Worker’s Compensation Board slapped the company with a $17,000 fine for not carrying worker’s-comp insurance between March 2017 and February 2018. The company currently owes $62,722 and no payments have been received to date, a rep for the board told The Post. Workers’ comp is paid out when an employee is hurt at work and misses time.
Ex-staffers blasted the operation as a sweatshop that relied on legions of unpaid interns working full-time jobs.
“I experienced a lot of harassment when I worked for her,” one former contract employee told The Post. “Aurora would ask me to do things that were not in anyone’s job description, like scheduling her gynecological appointments. The work environment was so hostile that I was afraid to ask for my check.” The employee was ultimately terminated.
An ex-intern called James “quite cold,” adding that “she never gives recognition or acknowledgement to her team.”
James is also an alleged rent deadbeat, records show.
Aurora James called her “Tax the Rich” dress for Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez a “powerful message” — but it’s not one she has taken to heart.Getty Images
In August 2020, James’ landlord filed papers to evict Brother Vellies from their location at 71 Franklin St. in Brooklyn, as well as demanding more than $25,000 plus interest for staying beyond the end of her lease. The case was settled.
She was sued by a previous landlord in February 2018 for more than $5,000 in unpaid rent at her shop’s old address at 209 West 38th Street in Manhattan.
“Aurora, obviously we did not want it to come to this, but you never have paid your rent in a timely manner,” wrote Matthew Mandell, a rep for her Manhattan landlord in a frustrated March 2018 email. “We have been more than patient.”
Though AOC proudly labeled James a “working class” designer as they waltzed down the Met Gala red carpet, her lifestyle has been anything but. As the pandemic raged across America, igniting a deep recession, James scooped up a $1.6 million residence in Los Angeles in September 2020.
The Tudor-style home with cathedral ceilings, a master-bedroom fireplace and backyard hot tub sits on 7,095 square feet in the posh Hollywood Hills, according to RedFin.
True to form, the property is already listed as “delinquent” by the Los Angeles County assessor’s office, which told The Post James owed $2,504 in property taxes.
Though AOC was comped tickets to the annual ball for boldfacers, entry to the famously exclusive Met Gala runs $35,000 a head. James attended the bash with Benjamin Bronfman, a rumored boyfriend she’s frequently spotted with. Bronfman, 39, is a scion of the powerful Bronfman family and its distilling empire. He is worth an estimated $100 million.
Photos from the event show the pair smiling broadly with Ocasio-Cortez and her boyfriend Riley Roberts.
The 37-year-old fashionista who made waves at the Met Gala with Democratic-Socialist AOC last week is a notorious tax deadbeat with unpaid debts dogging her in multiple states.Jose Perez/Bauergriffin.com / ME
She also found money to make a $2,700 donation to Hillary Clinton in 2016.
“It’s the height of hypocrisy when socialists attend a $30,000 per ticket gala with a message of ‘tax the rich’ while wearing an overpriced dress by a luxury designer who doesn’t pay taxes,” Republican Staten Island Congresswoman Nicole Malliotakis told The Post. “What happened to everyone paying their fair share?”
Both James and her reps did not respond to multiple requests for comment from The Post.
James pushed progressive causes long before making headlines for dressing America’s most famous socialist. After the death of George Floyd in May 2020, she created the 15 percent pledge, demanding that major companies commit to buying 15% of their products from black-owned businesses. The idea took off with major companies like Bloomingdale’s, Vogue, Sephora, and Crate & Barrel, according to a 15 percent pledge website.
“This is the least you can do for us. We represent 15% of the population and we need to represent 15% of your shelf space,” James said in an Instagram post announcing the idea.
Ocasio-Cortez, who has made a career out of demanding better worker wages and benefits, and taxing the rich to pay for her budget-busting federal programs, did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
Additional reporting by Ben Blanchet
AOC’s ‘Tax the Rich’ dress designer Aurora James owes debt in multiple states
General McKenzie admits Biden drone strike in Kabul DID kill seven children, aid worker and two other adults, says there was NO suicide bomber in car and offers 'my sincere apologies'
When you look at the entire Afghan fiasco I can only come up with this conclusion:
FAA Shuts Down Drone Footage of Bribem's Catastrophic Border Crisis
[Catastrophic goes with Bribem like peanut butter goes with jelly
Bribem ordered the FAA to shut down the air space around this bridge in Del Rio Texas so Bribem could cover up what's really happening at the border.
"The FAA claims the move is necessary for a "special security reasons" and that Border Patrol made the call for the TFR, but we all know what's really happening here."
The "special security reasons" are to cover his ass from Articles of Impeachment.
No one has the foggiest idea who these people really are or if they're infected with Covid. Most of the time they're just dumped into the country without being tested.
This is what they don't want you to see:
Little over a minute video.
Video 641
How can anyone watch this video, look at the photos, and claim there is no border crisis?
Oh...and Haitians are coming over too... a dime a dozen.
Pretty soon our country will look like the country they left.
After Fox News correspondent Bill Melugin and his crew showed Biden's border crisis reaching catastrophic levels this week, with 10,000 illegal immigrants waiting under a bridge in Del Rio, Texas, the Federal Aviation Administration shut down their ability to continue capturing footage of the disaster with a drone.
"The timing on this, the location a little bit curious. I just want to point out Fox News has been at the border for the better part of seven months now. We've been using the drone the entire time. It's never been an issue. All of the sudden the last 24 hours we start showing these images at this bridge and a TFR [Temporary Flight Restriction] goes up. We can no longer fly," Melugin told anchor Tucker Carlson Thursday night. "Unfortunately for those agents on the ground, they're completely overwhelmed."
Here's the footage of the situation prior to the flight restriction. Thousands of illegal immigrants are now coming to the point of entry from Haiti.
The FAA claims the move is necessary for a "special security reasons" and that Border Patrol made the call for the TFR, but we all know what's really happening here.
Meanwhile the crisis is getting so bad, Texas Governor Greg Abbott has moved to shut down six points of entry along the border.
"Six hours after U.S. Customs and Border Protection requested help from Texas to close ports of entry and secure the border, the Biden Administration has now flip-flopped to a different strategy that abandons border security and instead makes it easier for people to cross illegally and for cartels to exploit the border. The Biden Administration is in complete disarray and is handling the border crisis as badly as the evacuation from Afghanistan," Abbott released in a statement. "I have directed the Department of Public Safety and the Texas National Guard to surge personnel and vehicles to shut down six points of entry along the southern border to stop these caravans from overrunning our state.”
“The border crisis is so dire that the U.S. Customs and Border Protection is requesting our help as their agents are overwhelmed by the chaos. Unlike President Biden, the State of Texas remains committed to securing our border and protecting Americans,” he continued.
This is the dumbest most stupid thing I ever heard of !!! We're sending the Taliban money!! After spending $4.2 trillion over a 20 year period followed by the most disastrous military withdraw in American history allowing the Taliban to take over the country (the same Taliban that harbored bin Laden after 911) then gave them over $80 billion in military equipment after they killed 13 of our American servicemen and women... andthis is what the simpleton does now...
He is sending a terrorist group your money! The every day Afghan citizen will not see one dime of this money.
A group of Taliban fighters gather for a meeting at a luxury mansion
BTW... How are you "out" of Afghanistan if you're still sending them money?
-----------------------------------
US sending $64M in humanitarian aid to Afghanistan
The United States announced Monday it will send nearly $64 million in humanitarian aid to Afghanistan, a day after the United Nations issued an emergency call for $600 million to prevent famine and a public health crisis.
The U.S. was spending an estimated $300 million a day on the war in Afghanistan before its military withdrawal in recent weeks.
The Biden administration has yet to officially recognize the Taliban as Afghanistan's government since the militant group swiftly took power following the U.S. exit.
The funding will come from the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and the U.S. State Department and will be distributed through the U.N. and independent aid groups. The latest donation brings U.S. humanitarian spending in Afghanistan to $330 million this year, making it the largest foreign donor, USAID said.
In addition to these funds, USAID has also created a Disaster Assistance Response Team based outside Afghanistan to run the U.S. government's response to the unfolding humanitarian crisis, the release said.
[But nevertheless they are planning on sending them 600 million]
As part of today's announcement of aid, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken urged Afghanistan's neighbors to keep their borders open to Afghan refugees and promised to work to ensure that the Taliban does not hinder humanitarian assistance, especially to vulnerable groups like women and girls.
"We will continue to press for the Taliban to respect the rights and freedoms of women and girls, and are committed to preserving the gains Afghans, especially women, have made in the past 20 years," Blinken said in a statement on Monday.
This announcement comes after the U.N. reported last week that millions in Afghanistan was beginning to run out of basic aid supplies and food.
If their primary focus wasn't on killing people maybe they could farm the land for produce and raise animals like chickens, cows, and their favorite goats, and dig wells for water instead of growing poppies for the drug trade.
This is what happened after the Taliban said, "Have a Heart"...
