FIRST ON FOX: Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia recently bought a luxury waterfront condo from a top executive at Dominion Energy, a multibillion-dollar energy company developing a large offshore wind farm in his home state.
According to his 2022 financial statements filed this month, Kaine reported purchasing residential property worth up to $1 million in March 2022. A Fox News Digital review of local real estate filings showed that Kaine and his wife Anne Holton paid $895,000 for a multiple unit. condominium in Richmond, Virginia, from Dominion Deputy General Counsel George Marget on March 8, 2022.
The condo’s listing on Redfin, an online real estate company, claims the residence is “one of a kind” and “one of the largest and best condominiums” in Richmond. The condo has two master suites, a “gourmet kitchen,” dining room and includes three parking spaces.
Kaine’s disclosures further indicated that the senator made up to $15,000 renting the apartment from the “previous owner.” However, a spokesman for Kaine, who defended the purchase, saying it was negotiated by real estate agents, said the filing should have indicated “the previous occupant” since it was rented to a tenant who lived in the condo. at the time of purchase.
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Senator Tim Kaine has been a vocal supporter of Dominion Energy’s offshore wind project off the coast of Virginia. The project would be the largest in the US if completed. (Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images | Mark Harrington/Newsday RM via Getty Images)
“Senator Kaine and Anne Holton purchased their apartment on the Margets in a transaction brokered by real estate agents,” the spokesperson said in a statement to Fox News Digital. “The Margets did not live in this condo and instead had a long-term tenant who rented the condo to them. This tenant, who was not an employee of Dominion, asked if he could stay in the property for a period of time after the sale. while looking for a new place.”
“Senator Kaine and his wife agreed to rent the apartment to the tenant for approximately two months for the same amount of rent that the tenant had previously paid to the Margets,” Kaine’s spokesman continued. “Senator Kaine’s financial disclosure form is being corrected to reflect that the apartment was rented to the ‘previous occupant,’ not the ‘previous owner.'”
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Senate filings showed that Kaine ultimately amended the disclosure form after Fox News Digital’s inquiry.
Richmond-based Dominion is currently developing the Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind (CVOW) project, the state’s first offshore wind farm. Located on the state’s southeast coast near Virginia Beach, CVOW currently consists of two operational pilot wind turbines and is on track to be fully built out in 2026 with between 176 and 205 turbines spread over 112,800 acres .
Dominion Energy headquarters in Richmond, Va., pictured in 2020. (Zach Gibson/Getty Images)
Kaine has been a vocal supporter of the project, which would be the nation’s largest offshore wind development once built, urging federal regulators to speed up the permitting process and successfully win millions of dollars in funding to support projects.
“I am thrilled to see this project underway as it is an exciting step toward a clean energy economy that creates good jobs in the Commonwealth,” Kaine said in a statement included in a Dominion Energy press release of July 2021. “I will continue to push for clean energy investments in Virginia to boost our economy and build a more sustainable future.”
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The statement came after the Office of Ocean Energy Management advanced the environmental review process for the project. Kaine, other Virginia lawmakers wrote a letter to the agency months earlier, urging it to move forward with the review.
And Kaine helped secure $20 million in federal funds to improve the Portsmouth Marine Terminal, allowing it to serve as a staging area to support the construction and development of CVOW.
A lift ship is shown in December starting construction on an offshore wind farm off the coast of Wainscott, New York. (Johnny Milano/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Fox News Digital reported earlier this month that Dominion’s political action committee (PAC) has funneled $23,000 to Kaine’s campaign since 2011 and another $44,500 to Common Ground PAC, the affiliated and chaired Leadership PAC by Kaine, in that same time period. Kaine announced in January that he would run for re-election in 2024.
In a statement to Fox News Digital, Dominion echoed Kaine’s spokesman and defended Marget, similarly saying she sold her Richmond condo through a normal public process and that the executive and Kaine they kept “at a distance”.
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“In early 2022, Mr. Marget began an open sale process for a residential property he owned in downtown Richmond, with a public listing, open house and scheduled tours,” the Dominion Energy spokesperson said , Ryan Frazier, at Fox News Digital in an email. “The sale was negotiated between real estate agents representing the buyer and seller, with the buyer and seller at large.”
“Monthly payments from a tenant unrelated to Marget who lived at the property continued through the end of the lease term, which occurred after the transaction closed,” Frazier added. “Mr. Marget did not notify Dominion Energy of this transaction and had no obligation to do so.”
Thomas Catenacci is a political writer for Fox News Digital.
