Rep. Duncan’s son-in-law, Jason Brown, also works in real estate as a commercial broker for Schaad Brown. Brown is also paid by the congressman’s campaign — $350 each month since May 2011 to serve as the campaign treasurer on the account. However, he’s benefiting from the campaign in another way — he partially owns the building the campaign office is leasing.
Prior to 2013, when John Duncan III started working for his father, the only rent expenses incurred by the campaign were a $390 annual storage unit fee and prior to that a monthly $65 storage unit fee. (The younger Duncan claims there were previous campaign offices, but FEC filings do not back that up; people close to past campaigns also say there was never an office, or at least not since his early years in Congress.)
In September 2013, the campaign began to pay $600 a month to Keenland Heights for a suite in an office park on Center Park Drive in Knoxville. That office park is leased by Schaad Brown. In 2014 the campaign moved to a suite in a Kingston Pike building also leased by Schaad Brown. Rent stayed the same at $600, which the campaign continues to currently pay.
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It’s also unclear what, if anything, the office is used for, other than storing campaign signs. A recent visitor to the building could find no sign of an office for Rep. Duncan’s campaign after walking around and noted that the building directory lists only a blank line beside the suite number that is supposed to house the campaign. The congressman’s official Knoxville office also had no idea a campaign office was operating.
“He doesn’t have an office set up right now, because it’s not campaign season,” a staffer said when asked for the location.