A recent article in Willamette Week (WW) called Oregon’s first lady the most influential in state history. But, not for any positive reasons. According to WW, Cylvia Hayes has “played a central role” in Gov. John Kitzhaber’s administration. Hayes “keeps a desk in the governor’s office, attends senior staff meetings and communicates regularly with agency directors.” In fact, the biography Hayes provided to the National Governors Association lists her role in her husband’s administrations as a “policy adviser… on the issue of clean energy and economic development.”
Although Hayes does not receive a state paycheck, under Oregon law, she is considered a public official. Therefore, her “actions as first lady and as an adviser to Kitzhaber are governed by state ethics laws.”
That’s what makes the recent controversies involving Hayes so relevant.
While acting as first lady and “clean energy” adviser to Kitzhaber, Hayes has continued to work as “a private consultant on energy and economic issues.” The problem is that, according to public records, Hayes has violated state law by advising her husband on “economic and energy policies while accepting payments from private advocacy groups seeking to influence those same policies.”
Making matter worse, WW writes that Hayes has “regularly directed her state-paid assistant to do work for her private consulting business. And she has used her title as first lady and as adviser to the governor at events when she was not representing the state but instead appearing as a paid consultant.” Additionally, “Records show Hayes last year signed new consulting contracts worth at least $85,000 for work that overlapped with her work in the governor’s office.” According to WW, “That’s more than three times the income Hayes reported on the 2012 tax return.”
Hayes and Kitzhaber became a couple soon after he divorced his wife and left office as governor of Oregon back in 2003. Hayes became engaged to Kitzhaber shortly after he, once again, became governor in 2011. Hayes’ marriage to Kitzhaber would be her fourth marriage.
The details of Hayes’ third marriage became national news today after she admitted to entering into it illegally. According to Politico, “during questions from the press, Hayes, 47, admitted to being paid $5,000” to marry an Ethiopian man, Abraham B. Abraham, so that he could stay in the United States. Although Hayes was supposedly a mature adult at the time (29 years old), she claims to have entered into the illegal marriage with Abraham (18 years old at the time of the marriage) because she fell in with the wrong crowd.
You can read more about Hayes and Kitzhaber’s questionable dalliances with corruption here and here.
