Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema raised over $500,000 from the private equity industry before using her leverage to shield the industry from a tax increase, Common Dreams reports.
Sinema had massive leverage as the final holdout on the Democrats’ Inflation Reduction Act but used it to go to bat to kill a measure limiting the carried interest loophole, which allows hedge fund and private equity managers to pay a 21% capital gains tax rate instead of a 37% income tax rate.
Sinema also raised objections to language in the Democrats’ 15% corporate minimum tax proposal, demanding that private equity firms be exempted from the tax.
Democrats ultimately caved to Sinema’s demands, replacing the tax hike on private equity with a 1% excise tax on corporate stock buybacks.
Sinema raised $500K:
Sinema received over $500,000 from the private equity industry this election cycle alone, according to FEC data.
“This includes individual donations totaling $54,900 from executives at KKR, $35,000 from Carlyle, $27,300 from Apollo, $24,500 from Crow Holdings Capital and $23,300 from Riverside Partners,” the Financial Times reported.
That number represents 10% of all the money she raised from individual donors.
The securities and investment industry as a whole has donated $2.2 million to Sinema since she launched her first Senate bid in 2017.
Criticism:
"Remember the days when taking half a million bucks from an industry, and then passing legislation that only benefits that industry, while passing the costs onto everyone else, would be called corruption?" tweeted Brown University political economist Mark Blyth. "Today it's just lobbying as usual."
"Shame on Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, who had to be dragged kicking and screaming across the finish line, carrying water for her private equity overloads to the bitter end," said Erica Payne, founder of Patriotic Millionaires. "Thanks in large part to Sinema's obstruction, there's more work to be done, but the Inflation Reduction Act is a monumental step in the right direction."
