Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’ decision to cap her office salaries at $80,000 will let her chief of staff and senior employees avoid public transparency laws that would require them to reveal outside income, gifts, and stock trading activity.

The New York Democrat announced last week that she would institute “living wage” rules in her office, paying staff members a minimum of $52,000 a year and a maximum of $80,000 a year.

Under federal law, congressional employees who earn more than $126,000 a year — which includes most chiefs of staff — must submit public financial disclosure forms that detail outside income they earn, stock investments, debt, and gifts or paid trips that they are given by outside sources.

Ocasio-Cortez chief of staff Saikat Chakrabarti, a Silicon Valley entrepreneur, would be shielded from the public disclosure laws that apply to the vast majority of chiefs of staff in Congress.

Chakrabarti, 33, founded a Silicon Valley app-building company called Some Character LLC before taking an active role in left-wing politics. Last June, Chakrabarti purchased a $1.6 million home in Montgomery County, Md., according to real estate records reviewed by the Washington Examiner.

The National Legal and Policy Center, a government watchdog group, said the $80,000 salary cap for Ocasio-Cortez’ senior staffers was concerning because it could be used to intentionally evade financial disclosure laws.

“Purposefully underpaying staffers in order to avoid transparency is an old trick some of the most corrupt members of Congress have used time and again,” said Tom Anderson, director of the NLPC’s Government Integrity Project.

“It would have [her] staffers fall below the financial threshold for public disclosures,” said Craig Holman, the public affairs lobbyist for Public Citizen, a government integrity group. “The cap that AOC would impose would bring the chief of staff under that threshold.”

Holman said Ocasio-Cortez should ask her chief of staff to make his information public voluntarily in the interest of transparency. “She doesn’t have the force of law to do that, but she could convince the staff,” said Holman.

A spokesperson for Ocasio-Cortez did not respond to questions about whether the congresswoman would ask senior staffers to comply voluntarily with the disclosure law.

Holman said Ocasio-Cortez’ employees would still be required to submit confidential financial disclosure forms to the office, but the information would not be made public. He said public transparency is crucial to monitor the financial activities of Congress members and their closest aides. In 2017, Public Citizen flagged suspicious stock trading activity in Rep. Chris Collins’ disclosure forms that led to the New York congressman’s indictment on insider trading last summer.

The average salary for a chief of staff in the House of Representatives was $147,000 in 2015, according to the Congressional Research Service, well above the public disclosure threshold. Although Ocasio-Cortez' senior staff salaries would be capped at $80,000, they would be able to earn outside income without publicly revealing the amount or the source, according to Anderson.

Chakrabarti helped launch the advocacy groups Justice Democrats and Brand New Congress, which aided Ocasio-Cortez’ congressional campaign last year. According to the Justice Democrats website, Chakrabarti did not take a salary for his role because his outside business generated enough income.

“Saikat is lucky to have a small side business that generates him enough income that he is able to do all of this work as a volunteer,” said Justice Democrats in a statement last May.

Ocasio-Cortez’ spokesperson did not respond to questions about whether Chakrabarti currently holds any outside employment.