Jeb Bush’s Wealth Soared When He Left Governor’s Office, Tax Returns Show

After he left office as governor of Florida, Jeb Bush’s net worth grew to at least $19 million from $1.3 million, a significant leap in wealth that reflects the power of his connections and the breadth of his entrepreneurial pursuits.

Mr. Bush and his wife, Columba, reported $28.5 million in adjusted gross income from 2007, the year he left office, through 2013, according to tax returns he released on Tuesday. Nearly $10 million came from his speaking engagements.

The Bushes’ income topped out at $7.3 million in 2013, the last of 33 years of returns he made public. The return showed that they paid $2.9 million in federal taxes on that income, for an effective tax rate of 40 percent.

Mr. Bush’s disclosure of voluminous financial records comes early in a presidential campaign that has elevated the issue of candidates’ wealth, and the way it may distance them from ordinary Americans in an era of economic uncertainty.

After he left state politics eight years ago, Mr. Bush made clear that he wanted to make money. The mystery was just how much he had made.

The Bush campaign reported that the couple’s total net worth is now between $19 million and $22 million.

The wealth of America’s political dynasties is emerging as a major theme of the 2016 campaign. And while the fortune amassed by Bill and Hillary Rodham Clinton dwarfs what Mr. Bush collected, the records show that he similarly had little difficulty leveraging his prominent name to gain millions of dollars in the private sector.

Mr. Bush said his wealth has also allowed for significant charitable contributions. The couple reported $110,616 in donations on their 2013 return. In a statement on his website, Mr. Bush said they donated $739,000 to charity from 2007 to 2014.

“I’m proud of what Columba and I have contributed,” he said.

The effective tax rate of 40 percent that Mr. Bush paid compares with the 13.9 percent rate that Mitt Romney, the 2012 Republican presidential candidate, reported paying in 2010, a figure that drew widespread criticism.

The release of the returns, 16 months before the general election, is intended to position Mr. Bush as particularly open to scrutiny compared with other candidates. It included filings for several years that had previously been disclosed during his campaigns for governor. The Bush campaign said he has requested extensions for filing his 2014 taxes and his financial disclosure report, which will include details of his assets and liabilities.

Deep in the 2013 filing, he reported $5.8 million in “consulting and speaking” income. Separately, Mr. Bush’s campaign provided details of his engagements showing that he delivered about 260 paid speeches from 2007 to the present, for which he earned a total of $9.95 million. He listed 10 speeches at the Poongsan Corporation, a South Korea-based copper manufacturer that has long ties to the Bush family. His most recent audiences included the National Automobile Dealers Association and the American Council of Life Insurers.

The campaign did not release details of the income from his consulting engagements.

In the early going of the 2016 campaign, the candidates’ financial and business affairs have drawn particular scrutiny. Their wealth can be seen as a double-edged sword, signifying both financial acumen but also socioeconomic distance from most voters at a time when income inequality is a pressing issue.

Among the field of candidates, Mrs. Clinton disclosed in May that she and her husband had made at least $30 million since the start of 2014, largely from giving paid speeches. Senator Marco Rubio reported that he cashed out a retirement account last year. And in June, as he announced his candidacy, Donald Trump held up a document showing his net worth to be around $8.7 billion.

Mr. Bush and his wife have paid a higher tax rate than many fellow millionaires because most of his earnings come in the form of wages and salaries, instead of investment income, which is often taxed at a lower rate.

“One thing is obvious,” said Alan Viard, a resident scholar at the right-leaning American Enterprise Institute and a former staff economist in Congress, who took a cursory look at the returns. “Compared to many people in his income range, Jeb Bush clearly has less capital gains income, and therefore has a higher effective individual income tax rate.”

For several years, Mr. Bush, 62, has used an office at the Biltmore Hotel in Coral Gables, Fla., working closely with his son, Jeb Jr., while consulting, giving speeches and managing a private investment business.

One of his endeavors included serving as a paid director to the hospital company Tenet Healthcare, which backed President Obama’s Affordable Care Act. The position invited questions for Mr. Bush, who as a candidate opposes the health care law.

Mr. Bush profited handsomely from his Tenet shares. According to the newly released tax returns, Mr. Bush acquired $441,203 worth of stock in Tenet Healthcare in May 2011. The stock doubled in value by the time he sold it in October 2013, earning him a profit of $462,013 in just 29 months.

Like other hospital stocks, Tenet rose sharply from October 2012 through March 2013, when President Obama’s re-election made it likely that the health care law would be carried out. The law was considered a boon for hospitals because it was expected to increase business and reduce the expense of caring for uninsured patients who could not pay their bills.

Mr. Bush resigned from the Tenet board in 2014 when he was preparing for his presidential campaign, and this year sold off his stakes in his two remaining businesses as he contemplated a run for the presidency. He sold his consultancy, Jeb Bush & Associates, to his son and business partner, Jeb Jr., while also shedding his interest in the Britton Hill entities, a group of private investment and advisory firms.

His other high-profile and controversial engagements have included working as a paid adviser to Lehman Brothers, an appointment that included seeking an investment in 2008 in the failing bank from Carlos Slim Helú, a Mexican billionaire. Mr. Bush also consulted for the building materials manufacturer InnoVida, which went bankrupt and whose founder pleaded guilty to fraud charges.

The tax forms also trace the period in the 1980s and 1990s when Mr. Bush, then a young entrepreneur, was building his own political base in South Florida. He told a reporter at the time, “I want to be very wealthy.”

The returns showed that his average adjusted gross income was about $400,000 over the 18 years before he became governor.

Josh Barro and Patricia Cohen contributed reporting, and Kitty Bennett contributed research.