As the Pennsylvania senate race heats up, NBC10’s Lauren Mayk takes a look at the campaign of daytime TV host and Republican candidate Mehmet Oz. She spoke to him about his policies at a recent event in Bucks County.
Before he gave up his entertainment career to run for U.S. Senate, Mehmet Oz — the celebrity heart surgeon best known as the host of daytime TV’s “The Dr. Oz Show” — amassed assets worth more than $100 million, including homes, stock, life insurance and connections to his in-laws' tree-trimming empire.
Oz on Wednesday night filed a financial disclosure form required of all candidates for Senate that tallies a long list of investments — over 400 individual accounts, businesses or holdings that have value — that back up the finances of a man who has said he put $10 million into his campaign in Pennsylvania.
Oz valued his assets at between $104 million and $422 million, according to a tally by The Philadelphia Inquirer, a wide range that is a result of the Senate's request that each asset be valued within a certain dollar bracket. If elected, he would be one of the wealthiest members of the Senate — and possibly the wealthiest.
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He reported earning about $10 million in 2021, nearly all of it from his TV show host salary and ownership of the show's parent company.
Oz isn't the only multimillionaire in the seven-person Republican primary field in Pennsylvania.
Former hedge fund CEO David McCormick has yet to file a financial disclosure. Another wealthy candidate, Carla Sands, filed a public disclosure of assets last year, valuing more than 50 accounts or properties at between $35 million and $152 million.
For Oz, his filing shows at least $11.5 million — and possibly much more — in non-public stock in Asplundh, the tree-trimming company owned by his wife's family. He lists at least $6 million in non-public stock in the convenience store chain Wawa Inc. and at least $5 million in non-public stock in travel agency Five Star Travel Corp.
His tens of millions of dollars in equities includes millions in stock in Amazon, Microsoft, Sharecare and Google's parent company, Alphabet.
Oz lists two homes in Cliffside Park, New Jersey, overlooking Manhattan, that he values at more than $1 million each — including the one where Oz lived for a couple of decades before deciding to run for the Senate — plus another home in suburban Philadelphia valued at $1 million or more.
There's also his vacation home in Palm Beach, Florida, that Oz values at $5 million to $25 million and a cattle farm in Okeechobee, Florida, valued at $1 million or more. He puts the value of the cattle at $250,000 to $500,000.
Other assets include life insurance policies worth millions and interests in numerous commercial properties, including apartments in New York City and property on Boston’s Tremont Avenue and on Florida’s Clearwater Beach Island.
