Past financial deals of Treasury Secretary Jack Lew and Obama trade czar Michael Froman could be dragged into the administration’s bid to jam retroactive taxes on corporations that set up tax-avoiding operations overseas.
Critics of the administration’s plan to end so-called corporate “inversions” are looking at the investments that both Obama officials had in the Cayman Islands, a tax haven, before joining Team Obama.
If corporations are going to lose their tax advantages retroactively under a plan hatched by Lew and top officials, they said, then maybe there is a way to also target them through legislative amendments. Critics of the administration’s plan claim it amounts to double taxation.
“Even muggers only steal what you have on you,” said one Lew critic who works with Congress on corporate tax issues.
Paul Bedard, the Washington Examiner’s “Washington Secrets” columnist, can be contacted at [email protected].
