U.S. Rep. Lynn Westmoreland today voted against congressional Democrats cynical tax plan for AIG bonuses.
“House and Senate Democrats messed up big time and now they want to tinker with the tax code as part of a public relations stunt,” Westmoreland said after the vote. “I know Americans want to punish executives who are getting taxpayer dollars as bonuses – I know it because I’m just as outraged. But honest members of Congress have a duty to stand up against these shenanigans and explain to Americans that Democrats messed up and now they’re trying to sweep it under the rug.”
The legislation imposes a retroactive 90 percent tax for bonuses received since Jan. 1 by an employee of any company that has received more than $5 billion from federal bailouts. Language protecting these bonuses in the so-called stimulus package was written entirely by Democrats and signed by President Obama.
“I voted against the stimulus that allowed these bonuses and I voted against the TARP legislation that funded these bonuses,” Westmoreland said. “As I’ve said on the floor of the House, we don’t know what would have happened if Congress hadn’t passed TARP, but we do know that AIG’s employees wouldn’t be getting bonuses because they wouldn’t have jobs.
“I didn’t vote ‘no’ today because I support bonuses for AIG employees. I voted no because I can’t support using the tax code retroactively to punish a particular group or to score political points. I don’t want American taxpayers to get back 90 percent of the bonuses; I want them to get back 100 percent of the hundreds of billions they have doled out to corporations whose bad decisions have blown a gaping hole into the global economy.”
Watch Rep. Westmoreland’s video on the AIG vote: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mbrk37ofKHM
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Showing posts with label bonus. Show all posts
Showing posts with label bonus. Show all posts
Thursday, March 19, 2009
Boehner: The American People Deserve to Get 100 Percent of Their Money Back
Republican Leader John Boehner (R-OH) today delivered remarks on the House floor condemning taxpayer-funded bonuses for AIG executives and calling for passage of legislation that will allow American taxpayers to get 100 percent of their money back immediately. Full transcript of Boehner's remarks follow:
“Mr. Speaker, my colleagues, I caught a little grief five weeks ago when we had the stimulus bill on the floor. Remember the 1,100-page bill that no one had time to read and that no one did read? Obviously the President didn’t have time to read it either because in that bill was this one sentence. This one sentence that made it clear that someone knew that these AIG bonuses were about to be paid and they didn’t want them stopped. So somehow in the dark of night this one sentence was added to the bill so that AIG would pay these bonuses to their executives.
“This language wasn’t in the House bill. This language wasn’t in the Senate bill. This language showed up in the dead of night and no one got to see it. I’m wondering where did the language come from? Who wrote it? Who asked the conferees to put it in the bill? What conferees on the part of the House agreed to this? I’m looking for somebody to put their hand up.
“That’s the whole issue. This political circus that’s going on here today with this bill is not getting to the bottom of the questions of who knew what and when did they know it. Somebody was responsible to draw up this language. Someone brought it to the conferees. Someone brought it to the Democrat Leadership who wrote this bill in secret and put this language in there. But we have no idea who it was.
“Secondly, the bill before us tempts to recoup 90 percent of these bonuses. Why 90 percent? The American people are outraged. I’m outraged. And we just voted down an opportunity to bring a bill to the floor from our freshmen members that said, real simple, we ought to get 100 percent of this money back. We can get 100 percent back because the Treasury Secretary has the ability to get it all back. The Administration has the ability to get it all back. Why don’t we just get it all back? Why are we bringing this bill to the floor today to give members political cover when in fact the Treasury Secretary has the authority, the Administration has the authority to get all of it back? But, no, that got voted down. Our bill would have been a better bill.
“Thirdly, our colleagues, Mr. LaTourette and Mr. McCotter, have introduced a resolution of inquiry to get all of the documents surrounding communications between the Treasury, the Fed, and AIG to understand who was in the middle of this conversation? People have known about this for months and yet we just found out about it over the last 48 hours. And so we want this resolution of inquiry to be passed by the committee. We want to get to the bottom of all of this. But in the meantime do we have to have this political charade of bringing this bill out here? I don’t think so. I think this is a bad bill with bad consequences. We didn’t see the bill until last night. Nobody in the committee marked it up. Nobody debated it. And nobody understands the consequences of what we are about to do. How can we possibly vote yes on a bill like this? I yield back.”
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“Mr. Speaker, my colleagues, I caught a little grief five weeks ago when we had the stimulus bill on the floor. Remember the 1,100-page bill that no one had time to read and that no one did read? Obviously the President didn’t have time to read it either because in that bill was this one sentence. This one sentence that made it clear that someone knew that these AIG bonuses were about to be paid and they didn’t want them stopped. So somehow in the dark of night this one sentence was added to the bill so that AIG would pay these bonuses to their executives.
“This language wasn’t in the House bill. This language wasn’t in the Senate bill. This language showed up in the dead of night and no one got to see it. I’m wondering where did the language come from? Who wrote it? Who asked the conferees to put it in the bill? What conferees on the part of the House agreed to this? I’m looking for somebody to put their hand up.
“That’s the whole issue. This political circus that’s going on here today with this bill is not getting to the bottom of the questions of who knew what and when did they know it. Somebody was responsible to draw up this language. Someone brought it to the conferees. Someone brought it to the Democrat Leadership who wrote this bill in secret and put this language in there. But we have no idea who it was.
“Secondly, the bill before us tempts to recoup 90 percent of these bonuses. Why 90 percent? The American people are outraged. I’m outraged. And we just voted down an opportunity to bring a bill to the floor from our freshmen members that said, real simple, we ought to get 100 percent of this money back. We can get 100 percent back because the Treasury Secretary has the ability to get it all back. The Administration has the ability to get it all back. Why don’t we just get it all back? Why are we bringing this bill to the floor today to give members political cover when in fact the Treasury Secretary has the authority, the Administration has the authority to get all of it back? But, no, that got voted down. Our bill would have been a better bill.
“Thirdly, our colleagues, Mr. LaTourette and Mr. McCotter, have introduced a resolution of inquiry to get all of the documents surrounding communications between the Treasury, the Fed, and AIG to understand who was in the middle of this conversation? People have known about this for months and yet we just found out about it over the last 48 hours. And so we want this resolution of inquiry to be passed by the committee. We want to get to the bottom of all of this. But in the meantime do we have to have this political charade of bringing this bill out here? I don’t think so. I think this is a bad bill with bad consequences. We didn’t see the bill until last night. Nobody in the committee marked it up. Nobody debated it. And nobody understands the consequences of what we are about to do. How can we possibly vote yes on a bill like this? I yield back.”
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Wednesday, March 18, 2009
Pelosi Statement on AIG Legislation on House Floor Tomorrow
/PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Speaker Nancy Pelosi issued the following statement tonight on legislation the House will vote on tomorrow to hold companies, including American International Group (AIG), accountable for the bonuses that were paid to their executives. The legislation will recover the bulk of these bonuses by taxing them at a rate of 90 percent. Below the Speaker's statement is a brief fact sheet on HR 1586.
"We must stabilize the financial system in order to strengthen our economy and create jobs. We must also protect the American taxpayer from executives who would use their companies' second chances as opportunities for private gain.
"Because they could not use sound judgment in the use of taxpayer funds, these AIG executives will pay the Treasury in the form of this tax. I urge all my colleagues to vote in favor of this legislation and in favor of recovering taxpayer dollars and protecting Americans from the continued poor judgment of some of America's largest companies."
* * * * * *
As a result of extraordinary abuses of the public trust by companies rewarding employees with excessive compensation while receiving billions in taxpayer assistance, Congress introduced legislation to recover taxpayers' dollars.
The bill would apply a separate income tax rate of 90 percent to bonuses received by individuals from companies which have received at least $5 billion from TARP. It would also apply to bonuses paid by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
For this purpose, bonuses will be defined as any retention payment, incentive payment, or other bonus which is in addition to regular employee compensation payable on a periodic basis.
The special tax rate only would apply to individuals and families with overall income (including income other than bonuses) in excess of $250,000.
The bill applies to payments received after December 31, 2008.
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"We must stabilize the financial system in order to strengthen our economy and create jobs. We must also protect the American taxpayer from executives who would use their companies' second chances as opportunities for private gain.
"Because they could not use sound judgment in the use of taxpayer funds, these AIG executives will pay the Treasury in the form of this tax. I urge all my colleagues to vote in favor of this legislation and in favor of recovering taxpayer dollars and protecting Americans from the continued poor judgment of some of America's largest companies."
* * * * * *
As a result of extraordinary abuses of the public trust by companies rewarding employees with excessive compensation while receiving billions in taxpayer assistance, Congress introduced legislation to recover taxpayers' dollars.
The bill would apply a separate income tax rate of 90 percent to bonuses received by individuals from companies which have received at least $5 billion from TARP. It would also apply to bonuses paid by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
For this purpose, bonuses will be defined as any retention payment, incentive payment, or other bonus which is in addition to regular employee compensation payable on a periodic basis.
The special tax rate only would apply to individuals and families with overall income (including income other than bonuses) in excess of $250,000.
The bill applies to payments received after December 31, 2008.
-----
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