DNC Chief challenged to release returns
Daniel Halper in a post on the Weekly Standard notes Democratic National Committee chief Debbie Wasserman Schultz has been called on to release her personal income tax returns - which she has never done.
The request was made by her congressional opponent, Republican Karen Harrington of Florida.
“This week millions of taxpaying Americans will fulfill their requirement of filing their tax returns by paying any and all taxes due to the federal government,” Harrington’s campaign writes. “Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz has been asking Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney to release his 2011 tax return even after Governor Romney released his 2010 tax return.”
“Congresswoman Wasserman Schultz’s request of Governor Romney to release his tax returns screams of hypocrisy, because to the best of our knowledge, Congresswoman Wasserman Schultz has never released a single tax return of her own. As a member of Congress, she is required to release a yearly ‘financial disclosure,’ this yearly disclosure is not a tax return.
“While asking for Governor Romney to release his past tax returns, and in keeping with the spirit of President Obama’s call for ‘full transparency,’ we ask Congressman Wasserman Schultz to release her own tax returns.”
There are no records of Wasserman Schultz having ever released her personal income tax returns, though, as the Harrington campaign states, members of Congress are required to disclose assets, holdings, and various other financial information.
Wasserman Schultz has an annual salary of $174,000, which is the standard rate for members of Congress. As newsbusters.org notes, “her Congressional salary is more than three times greater than the median salary for individuals in her own district (FL-20) which is $54,194.”
Harrington’s request comes at a time when Democrats, Wasserman Schultz included, have been waging a war on taxes, trying to get Romney to release his financial records from years back. And at a time when Democrats, including the president of the United States, are pushing for increased taxes through the so-called Buffett Rule.