Bailed-out US banks owe millions in taxes

With so much distrust already surrounding the bailed-out companies after the AIG bonus fiasco, the banks find themselves immersed in another scandal as US lawmakers discovered that 13 of the banks receiving the 700 billion dollars owe millions in taxes.

After Congressman John Lewis and his House Ways and Means subcommittee investigated the top 23 recipients of the bailout cash, he discovered a startling fact: 13 of them still owe taxes.

We found that 13 of them owed more than 220 million dollars in unpaid federal taxes. Two companies owed over 100 million dollars each. How can this be? If we looked at all 470 (TARP) recipients, how much would they owe?

In order for any of the banks to receive the some of the TARP (Troubled Asset Relief Program) money, the bosses were required to sign a declaration statement that said their company's taxes were all up to date. For any boss to sign the declaration while knowing their company's taxes weren't current would be committing a crime, according to Neil Barofsky, the US government's chief auditor for TARP. Lewis also suggested that former treasury secretary Henry Paulson may have turned a blind eye to the unpaid taxes, while raising the issue of the public's perception to the news.

This is shameful. It is a disgrace. The American people are fed up, and they are fired up. And they are not going to take it any more.

Meanwhile, this new scandal will only continue to hurt President Obama's administration, despite the fact that TARP was set up by the outgoing administration late in 2008. According to Republican Congressman David Reichert, The lack of transparency in the program "has produced a credibility crisis that undermines the very confidence it was meant to restore."