Washington is awash with lobbyists seeking to address new steel and aluminum tariffs, and other potential tariffs, on behalf of both foreign and domestic clients. Lobbying on trade issues in some circumstances may trigger Foreign Agents Registration Act (“FARA”) obligations. The connection between trade lobbying and FARA was the subject of close scrutiny several decades … Continue Reading
This morning, the Unified Framework on Tax Reform was released by Republican members of the House Ways & Means Committee, Senate Finance Committee, and the Trump Administration. Some high level summaries and observations follow. Individual Rates Doubles the standard deduction to $24,000 for a married couple filing jointly and $12,000 for a single individual, thus … Continue Reading
On April 26, 2017, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and National Economic Council Director Gary Cohn introduced the Trump Administration’s tax reform proposal (the “Trump Proposal”) in a briefing. The proposal appears to borrow heavily from the tax reform plan put out by Mr. Trump during his presidential campaign with the significant exception that this reform … Continue Reading
President-elect Trump’s expressed interest in possibly raising tariffs on imported goods has prompted considerable effort in trying to understand the scope of Presidential authority to raise tariffs. While the Congress has primary authority to set tariffs and the U.S. has made extensive international commitments to not raise tariffs, President-elect Trump will have a degree of … Continue Reading
It is clear that the next Congress and President-elect Trump very likely will to try to do corporate tax reform — particularly international tax reform. Among the reasons this is the case is that there is an emerging consensus among both parties from a policy perspective that improving the business tax code could make America … Continue Reading
In a notice published in Friday’s Federal Register, the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC or Commission) has issued interim rules implementing the new miscellaneous tariff bill process mandated by Congress in the American Manufacturing Competitiveness Act of 2016. The rules create a new pathway for U.S. manufacturers to seek temporary suspension or reduction of tariffs … Continue Reading
The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) recently issued two private letter rulings (PLRs) that may be interesting for tax-exempt organizations that engage in political activity. In the first ruling, the IRS held that a company could not deduct payments made to charity under a PAC matching contribution program as an “ordinary and necessary business expense.” While … Continue Reading
Back in our January post, “Tax Reform is Dead! Long Live Tax Reform!” we predicted that the President’s approach to tax reform as outlined in his State of the Union speech was so fundamentally incompatible with the approach of congressional Republicans that comprehensive tax reform legislation was highly unlikely to make meaningful headway during this … Continue Reading
As we noted in our December 15, 2014 post “Tax Reform is Already on the Table,” “[g]iven the politics at play with a Republican controlled Congress and a Democratic administration, it is easy to expect tax reform will go nowhere.” Nonetheless, we noted the likelihood “that there will be a strong push by both parties … Continue Reading
The battle for future tax reform ignited even before the close of the 113th Congress. In the waning hours of the congressional session on December 11, outgoing House Ways & Means Committee Chairman Dave Camp (R-Mich.) unveiled H.R. 1, the sweeping corporate tax reform legislation that he and his staff had spent several years laboring … Continue Reading
In June, the European Commission (“EC”) announced the opening of three investigations into tax rulings in Ireland, Luxembourg and the Netherlands and, in particular, into tax rulings applied by Ireland to Apple, by Luxembourg to Fiat Finance and, last, by the Netherlands to Starbucks. In October 2014, the EC announced the opening of a fourth … Continue Reading
On Monday, September 22nd, the U.S. Department of the Treasury and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) published Notice 2014-52 (the “Notice”) announcing their intention to issue regulations that would address corporate inversion transactions. If issued in the form described in the Notice, the regulations would prevent certain narrow categories of inversions, including so-called “spinversions” and … Continue Reading
When Congress returns this week from the July 4th recess, it will once again find itself grappling with legislation to replenish the Highway Trust Fund, which is fast running out of money. Congress must act by the end of July to keep the Trust Fund solvent. If it doesn’t, the U.S. Department of Transportation will … Continue Reading
A funny thing happened on the way to renewal of the expired tax breaks discussed in “Important Tax Issues in Congress,” posted May 14, 2014. On May 8, the House of Representatives passed its first bill to extend one of the expired tax breaks. On May 15, however, the Senate failed to advance its broader … Continue Reading
Congress has a great opportunity to amend the tax code in a way which will benefit the environment, promote American jobs, and foster diversity in our energy sources. It can achieve these results by enacting the Master Limited Partnerships Parity Act. Since the early 1980’s, oil and gas producers have been permitted to use Master … Continue Reading
Now that comprehensive tax reform is dead in this Congress, the battle has shifted to tax extenders—the fifty odd temporary provisions of the tax code, most of which expired December 31, 2013. It is anticipated that, as in past years, most will be reauthorized. The Administration fired a broadside on May 6, however, threatening to … Continue Reading
