Which senior staff or board members receive the largest salaries at Turning Point USA?
Executive summary
Available public reporting shows varying figures for highest-paid people at Turning Point USA: investigative posts on executive compensation by Paddock Post list detailed payouts and note first-class travel and affiliate payments [1] [2] [3]. Salary-aggregation sites (Glassdoor, Comparably, Salary.com) report much lower ranges for staff and higher outliers for named executives — for example Glassdoor estimates senior director roles around $128,502 [4] while Comparably lists executives such as Mark Stegeman ($666,138) and James Dobbins ($604,618) among top earners [5]. These sources disagree on scale and methodology; Paddock Post analyzes nonprofit filings, Glassdoor and Salary.com rely on voluntary employee submissions, and Comparably aggregates executive compensation data without full public filing citations [1] [4] [5] [6].
1. What the filings-focused reporting finds: large executive payouts and travel perks
Investigative work published by Paddock Post that parses Turning Point USA’s tax filings and related documents highlights sizable executive compensation, notes payments routed through affiliated entities, and reports the organization paid for first‑class or charter travel for senior leaders including the “CEO, COO, and other TPUSA employees” [1] [2] [3]. Paddock Post emphasizes that some compensation may be split across related organizations that share addresses, complicating a straight read of a single Form 990 [1].
2. What employee-reported aggregators show: mid-six‑figure exceptions vs. typical staff pay
Glassdoor, Indeed, PayScale and Salary.com offer a different portrait: typical staff-level salaries reported by current and former employees cluster in the low five‑figure range for field and specialist roles and mid‑five figures for many positions (Glassdoor lists averages around $49k–$68k for common roles; PayScale lists an average near $54,264; Indeed shows similar ranges) [7] [8] [9]. Glassdoor’s internal summary also identifies senior director roles as higher — an estimated $128,502 — but those figures come from employee-submitted data, not audited filings [4].
3. Comparably’s executive outliers — large numbers, limited sourcing
Comparably lists much larger executive compensation figures — citing Mark Stegeman at $666,138 and James Dobbins at $604,618 among Turning Point’s highest-paid executives [5]. The Comparably summary presents a high average executive compensation ($150,278) but does not in the provided snippets link each name to the underlying IRS Form 990 lines; available sources do not mention Comparably’s document-level sourcing in these excerpts, so the methodology and whether these payments are direct TPUSA 990 line items or include affiliates is not clear [5].
4. Why figures differ: methodology, scope, and affiliated entities
Discrepancies across sources reflect three concrete differences in approach. Paddock Post examines nonprofit filings and notes payments through related/affiliated organizations [1]. Aggregators such as Glassdoor, Indeed and Salary.com rely on voluntary employee reports and produce role-based averages that undercount executives [7] [8] [6] [9]. Comparably provides executive-level figures that may incorporate bonuses, deferred compensation, or payments from affiliated entities, but the excerpts don’t show documentary proof [5]. Paddock Post explicitly warns that affiliate payments and shared addresses complicate attribution [1].
5. What can be stated with confidence from the available reporting
- Paddock Post’s investigations identify substantial executive compensation and travel perks and note payments via related organizations; that reporting treats Form 990 data as a core source [1] [2] [3].
- Employee-sourced sites consistently report routine staff pay in the ~$40k–$80k range and identify senior director roles as some of the higher-paid staff positions [7] [4] [8].
- Comparably reports specific executives with six‑figure-to‑mid‑six‑figure compensation levels but the available excerpts do not show the underlying filing citations to independently verify those line-item amounts [5].
6. How to verify who earns the most (next steps for readers)
To resolve the gap, consult Turning Point USA’s IRS Form 990 filings directly (the primary public source Paddock Post analyzes) and compare Part VII/Part IX executive compensation tables and Schedule R (for related organizations) to see payments to officers, key employees and related entities; Paddock Post has already done this analysis and flags affiliate payments [1] [2] [3]. Cross‑check those line items with named executive disclosures in reporting such as Comparably and note whether large sums are paid by TPUSA itself or by affiliated nonprofits or vendors [5] [1].
Limitations and final note: available sources present conflicting snapshots depending on method; Paddock Post’s filings analysis is the closest to primary-document reporting in the dataset provided [1] [2] [3], while Glassdoor, PayScale and Salary.com reflect employee-reported averages [7] [8] [6], and Comparably lists high executive figures without the underlying 990 excerpts shown here [5]. Readers should treat aggregated site averages as indicative of staff pay and filings-based reporting as authoritative for executive payouts — but verify line-by-line in the 990s to assign payments to named individuals or affiliated entities.