Memphis Slim
01-30-2008, 10:07 PM
WASHINGTON — Members of the Senate Finance Committee passed a bill Wednesday they say will fix a loophole in the House-passed economic stimulus package that allows some illegal immigrants to qualify for tax rebate checks.
The fix requires that anyone eligible for a rebate envisioned in a House-passed $161 billion stimulus package must have to have a valid Social Security number, rather than an Individual Tax Identification Number.
The stimulus plan overwhelmingly passed the House on a suspended vote, meaning no amendments were included on the initial legislation. A mini-brushfire broke out in the Capitol Wednesday as members realized that the decision to refund tax payments to ITIN holders meant illegal immigrants could possibly benefit.
The IRS classifies illegal workers in the U.S. for more than 31 days in the current year as "resident aliens." The majority of illegal immigrants in the U.S. are believed to be included as resident aliens under the IRS statutes.
Resident aliens can get an ITIN, pay taxes and file tax returns. The House measure expressly blocked "non-resident aliens," those who just arrived in the U.S., have not been deported and have not spent any "substantial" time here.
/**/
The internal warfare among congressional Republicans centered on whether or not illegal immigrants who earned at least $3,000 in taxable income were eligible for a rebate. House Minority Leader John Boehner insisted illegal immigrants would not benefit because they generally don't use ITINs to file tax returns since the very use of ITINs indicates the return may have been filed by an illegal immigrant.
Still, Boehner's argument did not answer the question about the inclusion of the words "resident aliens" in the legislation, so the Senate came up with a compromise. Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., a lead opponent of illegal immigrants getting rebates, said he was satisfied with changes made to the Senate panel's bill.
But Colorado Republican Rep. Tom Tancredo, one of the most-vocal anti-illegal immigration voices in Washington didn't appear to take solace in Boehner's argument or the Senate fix. In a letter sent to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, Tancredo implored the Senate to "fix" the loophole.
"Whether the total amount of checks cut to illegal aliens from the U.S. Treasury amounts to $600 or $6 billion, I do not believe the American public supports a stimulus package that reinforces the idea that there is really no difference between illegal aliens and American citizens. Worse, given the well documented tendency of illegal aliens to send large portions of their earnings back to relatives in their home country, it is quite possible that the lion’s share of any payments sent to illegal aliens will simply be sent abroad -- stimulating a foreign economy rather than our own," Tancredo wrote.
Speaking with FOX News, Tancredo complained that the Senate's proposed fix also doesn't address a much greater problem:
"The fact that we know that Social Security numbers are compromised, the fact that thousands of people, maybe millions of people, we don't know for sure how many people, filed an income tax form with a fake Social Security number. We also know that there's absolutely no communication between the IRS and Social Security Administration," Tancredo said..
Differences between House and Senate versions of the legislation require the chambers meet in a conference to create a single, unified bill. But the ability to craft a compromise may be more difficult than originally envisioned by the House, however, since the committee approved a stimulus package that gives Americans, who file individual returns $500 rebate checks if they earned less than $150,000 in 2007; $1,000 if married and filing jointly with a combined income less than $300,000. Families with children under 17 years old would get $300 per child.
The vote was 14-5 -- with three committee Republicans joining all the Democrats on the panel.
The new cap is higher than the House-passed version, which places a $600 limit on singles making $75,000 or $1,200 for joint-filing married couples who make $150,000. With assorted other elements, it raises the package to a cost of $193 billion.
Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., under tremendous pressure from his Democratic colleagues to cut America's richest taxpayers out of getting rebate checks, made the changes, and his ranking Republican co-chairman, Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa, spoke favorably about the caps being inserted despite his preference for no caps.
But that's not the only point of contention. An extension to unemployment benefits is shaping up to be the central fight when this bill makes it to the Senate floor. The committee extends unemployment payments for 13 weeks for those whose benefits have run out, with 26 more weeks available in states with a 6.5 percent unemployment rate. Only four states qualify for this extra assistance: Alaska, Michigan, Mississippi and South Carolina. Grassley said he was willing to go along with the measure if it meant increasing households eligible for the rebates.
Republicans are vowing to fight this measure, pointing to a private-sector analysis that shows jobs grew in January 2008. Sen Gregg, R-N.H., railed against the need for the extension, saying it could actually have the reverse effect of what's intended in a stimulus bill.
"To extend unemployment insurance by a year, in areas where you have full employment, you give a disincentive for people to go out and get a job," Gregg said. His own state's unemployment rate is well below the national average, at 3.6 percent
The Senate Finance Committee bill also gives rebate checks to more than 20 million low-income seniors who live on Social Security benefits. The disabled are also included in this, as they, too, get Social Security benefits. Baucus said 75,000 disabled veterans would get checks, as a result. This is different from the House bill, which gives no rebates to this group.
A $5.6 billion small energy temporary tax package was also included, benefiting those who produce biofuels like wind, energy, solar. That's on top of the $50 billion in incentives approved by the House.
The Senate also reconstituted a measure left out of House negotiations that lets businesses change the way they expense losses. The incentive lets companies that are losing money to apply 2006 and 2007 losses to tax returns from profitable years dating back to 2001 and 2002 so they can get refunds on tax payments.
Some Democrats had wanted to add money for food stamps and heating aid for the poor, but Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., feared that would load the bill down too much.
"We have to thread the needle here. We want to improve the bill, but we don't want to move it so far from the House bill that we slow it down," he said.
Speaking in California on Wednesday, President Bush said he prefers the House package, but wants to get legislation done by mid-February.
"If you're truly interested in dealing with the slowdown of the economy, the Senate ought to accept the House package, pass it, and get it to my desk as soon as possible," the president said. "The sooner you get a check the more likely it is the stimulus package will kick in and make a difference."
I cannot believe this.
The fix requires that anyone eligible for a rebate envisioned in a House-passed $161 billion stimulus package must have to have a valid Social Security number, rather than an Individual Tax Identification Number.
The stimulus plan overwhelmingly passed the House on a suspended vote, meaning no amendments were included on the initial legislation. A mini-brushfire broke out in the Capitol Wednesday as members realized that the decision to refund tax payments to ITIN holders meant illegal immigrants could possibly benefit.
The IRS classifies illegal workers in the U.S. for more than 31 days in the current year as "resident aliens." The majority of illegal immigrants in the U.S. are believed to be included as resident aliens under the IRS statutes.
Resident aliens can get an ITIN, pay taxes and file tax returns. The House measure expressly blocked "non-resident aliens," those who just arrived in the U.S., have not been deported and have not spent any "substantial" time here.
/**/
The internal warfare among congressional Republicans centered on whether or not illegal immigrants who earned at least $3,000 in taxable income were eligible for a rebate. House Minority Leader John Boehner insisted illegal immigrants would not benefit because they generally don't use ITINs to file tax returns since the very use of ITINs indicates the return may have been filed by an illegal immigrant.
Still, Boehner's argument did not answer the question about the inclusion of the words "resident aliens" in the legislation, so the Senate came up with a compromise. Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., a lead opponent of illegal immigrants getting rebates, said he was satisfied with changes made to the Senate panel's bill.
But Colorado Republican Rep. Tom Tancredo, one of the most-vocal anti-illegal immigration voices in Washington didn't appear to take solace in Boehner's argument or the Senate fix. In a letter sent to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, Tancredo implored the Senate to "fix" the loophole.
"Whether the total amount of checks cut to illegal aliens from the U.S. Treasury amounts to $600 or $6 billion, I do not believe the American public supports a stimulus package that reinforces the idea that there is really no difference between illegal aliens and American citizens. Worse, given the well documented tendency of illegal aliens to send large portions of their earnings back to relatives in their home country, it is quite possible that the lion’s share of any payments sent to illegal aliens will simply be sent abroad -- stimulating a foreign economy rather than our own," Tancredo wrote.
Speaking with FOX News, Tancredo complained that the Senate's proposed fix also doesn't address a much greater problem:
"The fact that we know that Social Security numbers are compromised, the fact that thousands of people, maybe millions of people, we don't know for sure how many people, filed an income tax form with a fake Social Security number. We also know that there's absolutely no communication between the IRS and Social Security Administration," Tancredo said..
Differences between House and Senate versions of the legislation require the chambers meet in a conference to create a single, unified bill. But the ability to craft a compromise may be more difficult than originally envisioned by the House, however, since the committee approved a stimulus package that gives Americans, who file individual returns $500 rebate checks if they earned less than $150,000 in 2007; $1,000 if married and filing jointly with a combined income less than $300,000. Families with children under 17 years old would get $300 per child.
The vote was 14-5 -- with three committee Republicans joining all the Democrats on the panel.
The new cap is higher than the House-passed version, which places a $600 limit on singles making $75,000 or $1,200 for joint-filing married couples who make $150,000. With assorted other elements, it raises the package to a cost of $193 billion.
Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., under tremendous pressure from his Democratic colleagues to cut America's richest taxpayers out of getting rebate checks, made the changes, and his ranking Republican co-chairman, Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa, spoke favorably about the caps being inserted despite his preference for no caps.
But that's not the only point of contention. An extension to unemployment benefits is shaping up to be the central fight when this bill makes it to the Senate floor. The committee extends unemployment payments for 13 weeks for those whose benefits have run out, with 26 more weeks available in states with a 6.5 percent unemployment rate. Only four states qualify for this extra assistance: Alaska, Michigan, Mississippi and South Carolina. Grassley said he was willing to go along with the measure if it meant increasing households eligible for the rebates.
Republicans are vowing to fight this measure, pointing to a private-sector analysis that shows jobs grew in January 2008. Sen Gregg, R-N.H., railed against the need for the extension, saying it could actually have the reverse effect of what's intended in a stimulus bill.
"To extend unemployment insurance by a year, in areas where you have full employment, you give a disincentive for people to go out and get a job," Gregg said. His own state's unemployment rate is well below the national average, at 3.6 percent
The Senate Finance Committee bill also gives rebate checks to more than 20 million low-income seniors who live on Social Security benefits. The disabled are also included in this, as they, too, get Social Security benefits. Baucus said 75,000 disabled veterans would get checks, as a result. This is different from the House bill, which gives no rebates to this group.
A $5.6 billion small energy temporary tax package was also included, benefiting those who produce biofuels like wind, energy, solar. That's on top of the $50 billion in incentives approved by the House.
The Senate also reconstituted a measure left out of House negotiations that lets businesses change the way they expense losses. The incentive lets companies that are losing money to apply 2006 and 2007 losses to tax returns from profitable years dating back to 2001 and 2002 so they can get refunds on tax payments.
Some Democrats had wanted to add money for food stamps and heating aid for the poor, but Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., feared that would load the bill down too much.
"We have to thread the needle here. We want to improve the bill, but we don't want to move it so far from the House bill that we slow it down," he said.
Speaking in California on Wednesday, President Bush said he prefers the House package, but wants to get legislation done by mid-February.
"If you're truly interested in dealing with the slowdown of the economy, the Senate ought to accept the House package, pass it, and get it to my desk as soon as possible," the president said. "The sooner you get a check the more likely it is the stimulus package will kick in and make a difference."
I cannot believe this.