Business & Economy

On The Money – All eyes on IRS audits

The IRS is under fire over questionable audits conducted during the Trump administration. We’ll also look at falling gas prices, AbbVie’s tax evasion tactics and the companies at risk of losing their assets to Russia. 

But first, President Biden just awarded the Medal of Freedom to 17 recipients, including his late friend Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and a few historic firsts.  

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IRS in political storm over Trump-era audits  

The IRS is at the center of a political storm over audits conducted on former FBI director James Comey and former deputy director Andrew McCabe

According to The New York Times, Comey and McCabe were both served a rare and highly demanding type of IRS audit following their firings.  

“The possibility that the former President or someone in the White House, his cabinet, his appointees, or leadership working under the Trump-appointed IRS Commissioner may have requested an audit of those deemed disloyal is alarming,” House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Richard Neal (D-Mass.) said in a statement Thursday. 

“It is unconscionable that someone within the IRS may have acted on this request out of loyalty to the Trump administration or fear of retaliation for failing to act,” he said. 

One wild stat: There was a 1-in-30,000 chance of Comey getting the NRP audit and a 1-in-20,000 chance of McCabe getting the audit, according to the Times. Taken together, that’s about a 1-in-600,000,000 chance of two randomly selected individuals receiving the same audit in a pool of more than 150,000,000 U.S. taxpayers. 

The Hill’s Tobias Burns breaks it down here

WHEN I DIP YOU DIP WE DIP 

Gasoline prices dip a quarter from recent $5 highs 

Gas prices fell slightly this week, with a select few stations dropping beneath $4 per gallon as prices fall across the board.  

Still, this is a small share of the more than 100,000 gas stations in the U.S. The Hill’s Rachel Frazin and Zack Budryk have more. 

SHADY RECORDS

Drug company AbbVie used Trump tax law to shield profits, Senate report finds 

Pharmaceutical giant AbbVie generates almost all of its sales in the United States but has allegedly exploited former President Trump’s tax law to shield much of its sales from taxes, according to an interim report released Thursday by Democrats on the Senate Finance Committee. 

AbbVie makes the arthritis drug Humira, which has been the best-selling drug in the world for several years. Over the last four years, AbbVie has sold $62 billion worth of Humira in the United States. 
Find out more on this here from The Hill’s Nathaniel Weixel. 

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SOON TO SEIZE

At least 47 major companies at risk of having Russia seize key assets: report 

At least 47 multinational companies with a presence in Russia, including gas giant BP and aircraft behemoth Boeing, are at risk of having key assets seized by the Russian government. 

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February spurred dozens of major international companies to pull out of the country amid sweeping sanctions imposed by the United States and its allies. 

A report that will be published next week from the Russian monitoring organization the Moral Rating Agency says the Kremlin may soon seize or redirect assets of those companies to a friendlier firm. 

The Hill’s Brad Dress has more here

Good to Know

From The Associated Press: “More Americans applied for unemployment benefits last week and while layoffs remain low, it was the fifth consecutive week that claims topped the 230,000 mark and the most in almost six months. 

“Applications for jobless aid for the week ending July 2 rose to 235,000, up 4,000 from the previous week and the most since mid-January, the Labor Department reported Thursday. First-time applications generally track with the number of layoffs. Until early June, claims hadn’t eclipsed 220,000 since January and have often been below 200,000 this year.” Read more

Here’s what else we have our eye on: 

That’s it for today. Thanks for reading and check out The Hill’s Finance page for the latest news and coverage. We’ll see you tomorrow. 

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