Bryan Steil Billionaires & Big Business Cost of Living Wisconsin

Bryan Steil Took $27,100 From Blackstone Executives in the Weeks Before He Voted for a Bill That Would Cut Rental Help for Millions

In mid-April 2023, Blackstone's CEO and other executives of the giant landlord gave Bryan Steil $27,100. On April 26 he voted for a House Republican bill that housing experts estimated would leave about 2 million people without rental assistance. Two months later came the bank checks.

MAGA Report Cards · Oct 16, 2026

In mid-April 2023, Bryan Steil's campaign got a run of checks from one company: Blackstone, the private-equity giant Civic Media describes as the largest landlord in the United States.

On April 26, Steil voted for a House Republican bill that would have forced deep cuts to the programs that help families pay rent.

Civic Media reported the timing this week. We checked the records ourselves.

The Blackstone checks

Federal Election Commission records show Steil's campaign took $37,000 from Blackstone employees in April and May 2023 — $27,100 of it between April 11 and April 19, in the run-up to the vote, and the other $9,900 in the days right after it. The givers included:

Stephen Schwarzman, Blackstone's chairman, CEO and founder — $6,600
A senior managing director — $6,600
The head of Blackstone's government relations — $3,300
People in Blackstone's real estate, private equity and finance arms

After the vote, another senior managing director gave $6,600 on April 27 and Blackstone's general counsel gave $3,300 on May 1.

The vote

The bill was the Limit, Save, Grow Act, House Republicans' plan to pair a debt-ceiling increase with deep spending cuts. Steil voted yes.

The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a nonpartisan research group, looked at what those cuts would mean for housing. Because House Republicans promised to protect defense and veterans' health care, everything else — including rental assistance — would have to be cut by about a third in 2024. Using Biden administration estimates, CBPP found that would mean about 989,000 fewer households, or roughly 2 million people, getting federal rental assistance in the first year alone. Most of them would be older adults, children or people with disabilities.

For a company that makes its money renting homes, fewer families with rent help means more families competing for apartments with no help at all.

Then came the banks

Civic Media also traced money around two other votes that summer.

On June 23, 2023, Steil voted for H.R. 3564, the "Middle Class Borrower Protection Act", a bill to undo a federal change to mortgage fees. Civic Media reports it would have raised costs for many middle-class and first-time homebuyers.

FEC records show PAC contributions the campaign recorded two days after that vote from some of the country's biggest banks: Wells Fargo ($9,000), JPMorgan Chase ($5,000), Bank of America ($2,500), Citigroup ($2,000) and Flagstar Bank ($1,000). The Mortgage Bankers Association's PAC added $2,500 a few days later.

He also voted twice that year for the REINS Act, which would require Congress to approve major new regulations — including rules from consumer watchdogs like the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Civic Media found checks from a Flagstar Bank lobbyist and from Huntington Bancshares' PAC around those votes too.

What this does and doesn't show

A campaign check right before or after a vote doesn't prove the vote was bought, and Steil would likely say he votes his principles. His office didn't respond to Civic Media's request for comment.

What the records do show is who was paying for Steil's campaign while he cast these votes. He voted for cuts to rent help while taking money from a giant landlord, and for a bill rolling back a mortgage-fee change while the banks that write those mortgages sent checks.

It fits a pattern. Steil bragged about bringing Wisconsin $94.3 million for lead pipes after voting against the law that paid for it, and he attached a voter suppression bill to a "stock trading ban" that lets members keep trading.

What the filings show

In April 2023, Blackstone executives — including CEO Stephen Schwarzman — gave Bryan Steil $27,100, and on April 26 he voted for a House Republican bill that CBPP estimated would leave about 2 million people without federal rental assistance in its first year. Two months later he voted to undo a mortgage-fee change, and the PACs of Wells Fargo, JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Citigroup and Flagstar sent checks the campaign recorded two days after the vote.