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Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, D-Ariz., did all she could to protect a tax loophole for private equity billionaires that allow them to pay a far less tax rate than the workers of Slavelandia.
Sinema received about $2.3 million from securities and investment executives since 2017 and was a crucial vote for President Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act. (See “SENATE PASSES BILL TO ENRICH THE RICH AND SCREW THE PEOPLE.”)
We correctly reported last week that the key takeaway from the bill that is being praised by Democrats is that the BIGS will continue to get BIGGER—leaders from companies like JP Morgan, BlackRock, Blackstone, KKR, the Too-Big-To-Fail Gang, who buy politicians while the average American worker falls further behind.
Democrats needed a win and they knew that Sinema would not budge on the issue. NBC News said Democrats made Sinema “do something she managed to avoid for more than a year: take ownership of protecting a controversial tax break that benefits wealthy investment managers.”
Estimates said closing the loophole would have provided the government with $14 billion in additional revenue over the next 10 years.
The tax is popular among Democrats, but many Democrat leaders also benefit from generous support from the financial industry.
Sen. Chuck Schumer, who also received $1.28 million from these donors, said the party had “no choice” but to part with the provision to save the bill that delivers on campaign promises like funding climate change and health initiatives. The bill will cost about $300 billion and increase taxes of about the same amount over the next 10 years.
The Wall Street Journal reported on how private equity dollars have been increasing in politics. (See “U.S. ELECTION RESULTS POINT TO REVOLUTION” and “WALL STREET GANG SPENT $3 BILLION ON 2020 ELECTION CAMPAIGNS.”)
The paper reported that major private equity firms formed a trade group called the American Investment Council that has changed the game in D.C. Drew Maloney, the CEO of the trade group, wrote in an op-ed in an Arizona newspaper that Sinema is a crucial vote on the bill and it is up to her to “continue supporting private investment’s role in helping small businesses here in Arizona and across the country.”
Translation: You better behave.
Sinema’s office said in an email to CNBC that the senator makes all her decisions with one thing in mind: “What’s best for Arizona.”
People familiar with the matter told the news outlet that her office was inundated with calls from hedge fund lobbyists to make sure that she would stand firm in her support.
The New York Times reported that, while a congresswoman in 2016, she praised private equity investors from the House floor and said they provide “billions of dollars each year to Main Street businesses” that impact “130,000 workers and their families” in her state alone.
TRENDPOST: WSWS.org has been highly critical of the bill and on Friday blasted supporters for presenting it as though it’s a major piece of social reform legislation when, in fact, it is a “pro-corporate bill” and merely a “desperate attempt to reverse Biden and the Democrat’s collapsing popular support in the run-up to the November 8 midterm elections.”
The website even downplayed the 15 percent minimum tax on corporations that pull in $1 billion or more per year. Sinema spoke with several business organizations and tacked back on an accelerated depreciation allowance for manufacturing companies that the website called nothing more than a “tax dodge.”
TREND FORECAST: Only the rich, powerful and those who suck up to them are able to run in political elections in America. The Wall Street Journal, citing AdImpact, reported that total spending on midterm elections will approach $9.7 billion. In 2018, about $4 billion was spent. OpenSecrets.org said the securities and investment industry donated $610 million in total from 2021 to 2022, which led all other industries.
TREND FORECAST: The BIGS will continue to avoid paying their fair share despite getting tax breaks as they did under the Trump administration when he lowered rates.
Robert Reich, the former secretary of labor, tweeted that the carried interest loophole is a “pure scam.”
“Private equity managers get this tax break even though they invest other peoples’ money,” he wrote. “They don’t risk a penny of their own. Obama, Trump, and Biden promised to get rid of it. Why couldn’t they deliver? Two words: Big Money.”
Stephanie Ruhle, the MSNBC host, took issue with the comments from Sinema’s office that she only has the people of her state in mind. She tweeted, “Carried Interest serves pretty much NO ONE in Arizona—but there are some dudes on mega yachts on the Mediterranean toasting Senator Sinema tonight.”
TRENDPOST: As we have been reporting for decades, the Bigs get a free tax ride while the Little People of Slavelandia are taxed the fullest. We also noted how the rich pay nothing and people of Slavelandia are taxed to the highest limits. (See “AMERICA’S RICHEST 400 FAMILIES PAY A TINY PERCENT OF FEDERAL INCOME TAX COMPARED TO THE WORKING CLASS.”)
And, despite President Donald Trump’s bullshit that his 2017 tax cuts would be “helping the folks who work in the mailrooms and the machine shops of America, and “The plumbers, the carpenters, the cops, the teachers, the truck drivers, the pipe-fitters, the people that like me best… as we reported, 82 percent of President Trump’s 2017 tax cuts enriched the one percent according the Tax Policy Center.