WASHINGTON – Senator Chuck Grassley said he voted today against another controversial government program that harms the good done by broadly supported small business tax relief, most of which he authored, in a bill passed by the U.S. Senate.
“Since the debate on this bill started, the Democratic leadership has been more interested in scoring political points than actually providing relief to small business, starting with a controversial lending provision to create a taxpayer-funded $30 billion bailout fund, or a mini-TARP,” Grassley said. “It’s just like the big TARP program that’s been badly mismanaged, and even Elizabeth Warren, the head of the TARP oversight panel, expressed skepticism that the fund would be effective in increasing small business lending and that it would even encourage ‘banks to make loans to borrowers who are not creditworthy.’ The taxpayers have had enough of that kind of thing from Washington.”
Grassley also said that the majority leader, Senator Reid, “ran roughshod” over the democratic process by refusing a reasonable and fair amendment process with this legislation.
“The Democratic leadership flat-out blocked my amendment, as it has twice already this year, to restore the biodiesel tax credit. At least 20,000 jobs in biodiesel have been lost since congressional leaders let this tax credit lapse at the end of last year. If the Senate would act today to restore this non-controversial credit, those jobs would return immediately,” Grassley said. “The bill also adds another new 1099 reporting requirement. This contradicts the bi-partisan support for repealing the onerous 1099 reporting requirements enacted in the health care bill earlier this year.”
Of the overall small business bill passed today, Grassley said, “There is a lot of tax relief in this bill that 80 or 90 senators support, and most of it comes from the bill (S.1381) I introduced in June 2009, which I want to see passed. But there was no reason or need to hold those broadly supported initiatives hostage to another big government spending program that the experts say would be another controversial and potentially ineffective taxpayer-funded program in Washington.”
Three documents are below:
•The floor statement Grassley made this morning about his biodiesel tax credit amendment. Watch the video here.
•The floor statement Grassley made last night about the small business bill passed today.
•A June 2009 news release describing the comprehensive small business tax relief bill that Grassley introduced (S.1381), which was most of the small business tax relief in the bill passed today.