Well, Putin got some of what he 'paid' Trump to do.
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SUMMARY:The Trump administration says it won’t impose any of the sanctions that Congress overwhelmingly voted to level at Russia for meddling in the 2016 U.S. elections. Part of the measure directed the Treasury Department to compile a list of Russian figures in an effort to "name and shame" them. John Yang talks to Andrew Weiss of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace about that list and more.
SUMMARY: The Obama administration has taken steps to rein in big businesses this week: New rules issued by the Treasury Department regarding tax loopholes ended a $160 billion deal between Pfizer and Allergan. Meanwhile, the Justice Department has filed an antitrust suit against a proposed oil giant merger, and more may follow. Gwen Ifill talks to Jim Tankersley of The Washington Post for more.
GWEN IFILL (NewsHour): The Obama administration took steps this week to rein in big businesses when it comes to taxes and mergers.
First, the Treasury Department issued tough new rules that make it harder for one company merging with another to lower its taxes by taking a foreign address. The President spoke out against the so-called inversions, saying they lead to one of the most insidious tax loopholes.
A day later, the drug companies Pfizer and Allergan called off a $160 billion deal. Plus, the Obama Justice Department is trying to block oil services giant Halliburton from merging with its rival Baker Hughes. Other proposed mergers may also be in trouble.
Jim Tankersley writes about this for The Washington Post.
Welcome, Jim.
JIM TANKERSLEY, The Washington Post: Thanks for having me.
GWEN IFILL: So, give me a sense of whether this is a conscious strategic use by the administration on tax policy to crack down on business.
JIM TANKERSLEY: Well, in this particular case, it’s absolutely the administration saying, this is a practice in the corporate world that we don’t like, and we’re going to use tax policy to stop it. It looks very tailored in particular to mergers like the Pfizer one, which, I mean, it’s very rare that you see a rule get announced on one day and a merger get called off the next, but that’s what they have pulled off here.
GWEN IFILL: So, one of the things that they — when we talk about this, though, for instance, the administration decided they wanted to make financial advisers more accountable to clients.
JIM TANKERSLEY: Yes.
GWEN IFILL: Is that part of that same strategy, or is that different?
JIM TANKERSLEY: I think what we’re seeing are two things.
Over time, we have seen the President sort of shed his inhibitions about taking positions that might be opposed by the business community. He doesn’t seem to really care too much anymore if he’s being called anti-business. So, we see like sort of string of decisions this week that we have mentioned that are all in that vein.
And the business community has howled, and he hasn’t really let that bother him. Shorter term, what we’re seeing, though, is the President, I think, is thinking about his legacy, and he knows right now we’re in a time, a very populist time, anti-corporate time in the America in the campaign.
And so by personally getting out and announcing details of the inversions rule, making the case for it, for example, this week, he’s trying to cement that rule in the public’s mind, so that the next President doesn’t change it or walk it back.
SUMMARY: Republicans stepped up demands for action against the IRS for targeting conservative political groups, the day after the Treasury Department released a report saying the IRS used inappropriate criteria in assessing tax-exempt status. Gwen Ifill reports on Attorney General Eric Holder's testimony in a House Judiciary hearing.
SUMMARY: Jack Lew has been White House chief of staff and budget director, and, as Jeffrey Brown reports, is now in line to become the center of President Obama's economic team as Treasury Secretary. Judy Woodruff talks to Julianna Goldman of Bloomberg News and Jared Bernstein of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
SUMMARY: Though significant steps have been taken, tensions remain between reform and hardline Burmese politicians. Margaret Warner talks to U.S. Campaign for Burma's Jennifer Quigley and Open Society Foundation's Maureen Aung-Thwin for more on what the U.S. role should be in encouraging Myanmar's path to greater democracy.
MARGARET WARNER (Newshour): Today, the Treasury Department removed Myanmar's president and house speaker from a list of individuals barred from doing business or owning property in the U.S.
I'm joined now by Burmese-born Maureen Aung-Thwin, who was taken off the Myanmar government's blacklist in the last few weeks. She directs the Open Society Institute's Burma Project.
And Jennifer Quigley, advocacy director of the U.S. Campaign for Burma. Both were at the congressional medal ceremony today.
I am Retired U.S. Navy (22yrs) and a Vietnam Veteran. After my Navy retirement I was in the computer related industry, now retired. In 2000 I was a registered Republican and voted for George W. Bush. Six months of having Bush in the Whitehouse forced me to re-evaluate my political stance. I had always thought of myself as a Moderate Republican, but was a Republican by "default" NOT because of close examination of the GOP. Due to what has happened in America since 2000, I now consider myself a progressive, and registered as a Non-Affiliated voter.
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