Tag: taxes

Designer of AOC’s ‘Tax The Rich’ Met Gala Dress Owes Over $100K in Back Taxes, Accused of Being a Rent Deadbeat and Running ‘Sweatshop’ of Unpaid Interns

Proving irony never goes out of style, Aurora James, the designer of Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’ (D-NY) viral “Tax the Rich” Met Gala gown, is a tax deadbeat herself, according to a report by the New York Post.

James is “a notorious tax deadbeat with unpaid debts dogging her in multiple states,” reported the Post, digging up records that show six IRS tax liens totaling $103,220 on the parent company of her fashion brand, three open tax warrants in New York State for failing to withhold $14,798 in income taxes from employee paychecks (plus twelve other since-resolved NY tax warrants), and a $17,000 fine for failing to carry worker’s compensation insurance.

She’s also a rent deadbeat, the Post claims, describing an eviction action by James’ previous landlord — along with a demand for more than $25,000 plus interest for staying beyond her lease. The case was settled for an undisclosed amount.

Another previous landlord reportedly sued James for more $5,000 in unpaid rent, sending her a letter complaining that she had “never have paid your rent in a timely manner.”

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The Other Shoe Drops: Biden Admin Announces Millions in Aid to Afghanistan

The Biden administration has just announced they will be cutting a check for $64 million in “humanitarian aid” to Afghanistan through USAID and Samantha Power.

Supposedly, this aid will go through the UN and NGOs, not through the “government”/Taliban or whoever is currently in control. Here’s Secretary of State Antony Blinken talking about it during his hearing on Zoom with Congress today.

Sorry, but I don’t trust the UN, and who knows who is in charge of some of the NGOs, so even if the money went to those folks, that it wouldn’t end up in the pockets of the Taliban, by force or by design.

Rep. Scott Perry (R-PA) questioned Blinken on this earlier today, making the point that they can’t guarantee where that money is going–  just like they gave aid to Pakistan while that country was helping the Taliban.

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Groups push back against Biden’s plan to grant IRS access to your bank account (and PayPal) transaction data

Banking industry officials and other financial services firms are bracing for a long fight over a bill that will require banks to share consumer account information with the Internal Revenue Service to boost federal tax revenue.

This notion originally gained traction this spring within the American Families Plan by the Biden administration. But bankers and even some consumer groups have slammed it as a compliance concern and a privacy issue. Financial institutions already provide the IRS with large quantities of data.

As part of the 3.5 trillion dollar budget reconciliation package proposed by the Biden administration, legislators are considering this invasive proposal as an income source to fund the massive budget.

The Biden administration argued that bank surveillance would prevent tax evasion, but many are obviously concerned that it’s a breach of the Fourth Amendment (which protects people from unreasonable searches and seizures by the government) and would also favor those who are embracing the move towards decentralized finance and cryptocurrencies, as well as those that use off-shore accounts.

The proposals would force banks to report every deposit and withdrawal related to a bank account and would also include centralized companies such as PayPal, Venmo, (owned by PayPal), CashApp, and cryptocurrency exchanges.

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Biden proposal would give the IRS access to your bank account

Tax law and federal budgets are inherently boring things, so it comes as no surprise that language is often slipped into those bills that would otherwise cause outrage if proposed individually.  Like giving the IRS access to your personal and business bank account.

The Biden Administration’s 2022 budget proposal — which claims to advance “equity across government” — included a provision that generally slipped under the radar, but would impose onerous new reporting requirements on community banks and raises privacy questions.

The Independent Community Bankers Association reports that the proposal would require financial institutions to report information on customer bank accounts to the IRS.

Currently, banks are only required to report deposits of $10,000 or more, however, the proposal would require banks and other financial institutions to report to the IRS on the deposits and withdrawals of all business and personal accounts with a balance of more than $600. 

The Kansas Bankers Association objected strongly to the proposed requirement and said flatly that they stand in opposition.

“The new reporting requirements would raise questions about customers’ right to privacy, create unnecessary and expensive burdens for banks and raise the cost of tax preparation for small businesses,”  President & CEO Doug Wareham said in a statement. “While all banks would be affected, small community banks with limited internal resources will be especially burdened by this new requirement. The new requirements will require a massive and expensive compliance effort to track and report inflows and outflows on all bank products.”

ICBA — and 44 other community bank associations — have more or less gone to war over this issue sending out a  fact sheet and hearing statement, a Minority Bank Advisory Council letter to congressional leaders, a joint letter with 44 state community banking associations, and thousands of grassroots messages from community banks. 

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This Is How America’s Ultra Wealthy Are Evading The Democrats’ New Taxes

For most Americans, the term Private Placement Life Insurance, or PPLI, is financial gibberish. But for the ultra-wealthy, those who represent the top 0.1% in the wealthy pyramid, that acronym represents financial freedom from the coming Democratic tax hike tsunami.

As many ultra wealthy Americans – those whose net worth is $20 million and over – scramble for places to hide from Democrat plans to hike their taxes, many on Wall Street think they’ve found just the thing, and as Bloomberg reports today the tax oasis is a niche strategy called private placement life insurance, which is was already gaining popularity among the very rich for its ability to shield fortunes from taxes. Advisers to the top 0.1% already say it’s dominating conversations with their clients.

The threat of higher taxes, which President Biden has affectionately called making billionaires and millionaires pay their “fair share”, isn’t the only factor sparking interest in PPLI: as Bloomberg’s Ben Steverman writes, “a little-noticed change in US insurance law at the end of 2020 makes the tool more powerful, at the same time that competition among insurance carriers and advisory firms is giving rich investors more flexibility, lower costs and a wider choice of products on PPLI platforms.”

The math is simple: as long as assets are held in a PPLI policy, they escape taxes, much to the horror of wealth redistributionists like Elizabeth Warren. When the holder of a PPLI policy dies, heirs inherit the PPLI’s contents tax-free, a perk which strikes at the heart of Biden’s plans to get the very wealthy to pay more taxes on their investments, especially on capital gains that currently aren’t levied if assets are held until death.

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