Katie Porter Calls Out the Real Reason Joe Manchin Wants to Cut Cost of $3.5 Trillion Infrastructur

[riversedge]

Much older article but worth repeating!




Katie Porter Calls Out the Real Reason Joe Manchin Wants to Cut Cost of $3.5 Trillion Infrastructure Bill
https://secondnexus.com/katie-porter-manchin-corporate-donors


Evan Brechtel Sep. 09, 2021



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Porter put the pressure on Manchin in a recent interview with MSNBC's Stephanie Ruehl.

Watch below.

Porter pointed out that, rather than lowering the price tag at the expense of lifesaving features of the bill, it could be paid for with sensible revenue measures like greater IRS enforcement and expanded taxes on corporations.

She then suggested the actual motive for Manchin's opposition:

"I have the will to do it. The question is does Senator Manchin, or is he more concerned about his corporate donors, including large corporations, the oil and gas industry, the big pharmaceutical industry, and others who are getting away with paying nothing under our current tax system?"

https://secondnexus.com/katie-porter-manchin-corporate-donors

It's no secret that Manchin has heavy financial support from those representing fossil fuel interests. Natural gas company Tellurian is one of Manchin's top donors, to name one................................

[JaneQPublic]

1. Manchin's Top 20 Donors: Fossil Fuel industries well represented

From Open Secrets:

https://www.opensecrets.org/politicians./contrib.php?cycle=2016&cid=N00032838&type=I

[BradAllison]

2. Katie would be alerted on here. n/m

[LakeArenal]

6. I thought the same.

[Magoo48]

14. Thank You Katie Porter.

She is our rep and we’re quite proud of her.

[sarcasmo]

23. +1

[Walleye]

3. It seems that campaign contributions have nothing to do with an actual campaign

[mitch96]

5. And nothing to do with helping his constituents...nt

[Walleye]

11. Some of these guys aren't even aware of who their constituents are. Citizens of their state

In West Virginia almost the poorest state in the nation. You’d think he’d have a little pride in his state if nothing else. It’s almost as if he hates the people who suffer poverty in West Virginia

[monkeyman1]

30. constituents who ?

[certainot]

12. he's enabled by constituents that flew out of limbaugh's ass and putin helped create

in 2009 russian hackers got intio the east anglia climate institute's emails and withion days wikileaks was involved and an analyzed version with emails taken out of context was on limbaughs desk. he used them for a week to say it's proof its a hoax and created 'climategate', just in time to stop obama at the copenhagen conference.

limbaugh called climates scientists like michael mann traitors and they got death threats. mann is at penn state, which supports 11 xlimbaugh stations. penn state is one of 87 listed at fakenewsradio.org, which support/broadcast sports on 260+ xlimbaugh stations - without complaint from environmental groups. all of them are licensed to operate in the public interest, but like all rw stations in manchins state they all have been selling global warming denial.

our environmental groups continue the biggest political mistake in history, ignoring rw radio and wasting our donations playing catch up.

[Farmer-Rick]

4. The handful of lucky filthy rich use their money to force us to carry the tax burden

If you want a government, someone has to pay for it. Even if the only thing you use your government for is to protect the privileges of the filthy rich and their wealth extraction method of choice - corporations.

And who would of thought the filthy rich would use the wealth capitalism, luck and psychopathy allowed them to accumulate against the very people and organizations that made them?

The filthy rich using our government to ensure you and I pay for their protections. When are we going to finally admit that our democracy disappeared around the time of Reagan?

[Zeitghost]

22. Not really

I'm not saying they don't need to pay more, but the top X% generally cover more than X% of the tax burden.

The top 1% cover ~40%, the top 10% cover ~70%, the top 50% cover ~97%.

[FakeNoose]

24. The top 10% own over 80% of the wealth

The system has been crafted (since Ronald Reagan's time) to work for them and practically nobody else.

I'd be interested in hearing your proposal as to how we can even have an American government, if the ultra-wealthy refuse to pay their fair share of taxes.

[Zeitghost]

25. I'd...

Raise long term capital gains on the top earners for starters.

Like I said, I have no issue taxing them more. I was only challenging the point that the rest of us pay their way. That's simply not true.

[FakeNoose]

27. So maybe the issue, is how much should they be required to pay?

Whatever they should be required to pay, that amount becomes "their share."

[Texin]

7. We've ALL known he's beholden to his donors in the fossil fuel business.

Alternative energy sources are antithetical to those industries and he's been bought and paid for by them for years.

I don't know to whom Sinema is beholden to.

[luv2fly]

8. Pharma

She was against them until she was for them.

[Sympthsical]

10. It isn't just donors. He directly earns income from the industry.

Manchin has a long history with coal in West Virginia, and served as President of Enersystems, a privately-held coal & resource company, in the 1990s. He’s still currently a key principal, holding an estimated $3,000,000 in non-public stock.

The Numbers: Along with his direct investment, Manchin receives substantial dividends from Enersystems annually. In 2019 and 2020, he earned an estimated $613,142 and $491,949 in dividend income. This equates to approximately 71% of his total portfolio income.

Enersystems is a large portion of Manchin’s overall investments. In 2020, his assets are estimated at slightly over $8,600,000, with 56% of that being stocks. In comparison to this, the energy company weighed in at 65% of that stock portfolio - and 35% of his entire net worth.

https://www.fineprintdata.com/post/manchin-enersystems

And his daughter is all in with the pharma industry. She was knee deep in the horror that was keeping epi-pens more expensive.

I don't think there's a lot of mystery here for why he behaves as he does. His family is getting rich.

And for alerters, this is all public, easily verifiable information.

[mitch96]

17. It's the old "pay to play" politics....... jeeze I hate it...nt

[soldierant]

19. Thank you for mentioning his daughter. That is important.

[ProfessorGAC]

20. Huh?

He got over $1.1 million in dividends on $3 million in holdings? 18% per year dividend payments? That's incredibly high.
That points to another obvious flaw in how incomes from equity in nonpublic companies are taxed.

[Sympthsical]

21. It's a privately held family company that he founded.

His son now runs it, but he holds substantial stock in it.

So, if it makes bucks, he makes bucks.

Tidy, eh?

[ProfessorGAC]

26. Like I Said...

...there's something wrong when that kind of profit is instantly realized but still only subject to dividend tax rates.
This is effectively a salary, emeritus status or not.

[Sympthsical]

28. It blows my mind it's even legal

And he's Chairman of the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources.

Whut?

Guy makes his money from coal while we're having a global warming emergency. And he's the Chairman.

Whut?

Could you imagine if Republicans managed that one?

[jaxexpat]

32. You've hit on Manchin's charm.

In a state where, due to the geography, neighbors aren't even sure they have neighbors, it's quite imaginable that Manchin's constituents cannot see him for the super-grifter he actually is. There are democrats with long traditional memories, who cast their ballot next to the D every time, retelling legends of Roosevelt. That would be the Democratic "base" in West Virginia. Theirs is a fanciful allegiance to democracy. Similarly, their Republican fellow citizens are not the regular sort either. All, though, seem to foster an essential distrust of government. They have inherited the sentiments of both sides in the coal miner strikes and violence of the last century. They are still reeling from having some "facts of life" forced upon them and their lopsided economy. Their "civil war" never ended. Manchin has a well-armed tiger by the tail. One should recall Senator William Byrd who dined with the Klan during one era while courting the NAACP in another.

[LaMouffette]

9. WHEN are we ever going to deal with campaign finance reform?!

Just imagine if every candidate received "X" millions of taxpayer dollars and "X" amount of free airtime for TV and internet ads and only the candidate herself/himself were allowed to run political ads. Other ads would be illegal. Donations over $200 from individuals would be illegal. Corporations not considered "people."

I know, I know, 1st Amendment rights, but how can we be a democracy with our ridiculously corrupt system of legalized political bribery?

[smirkymonkey]

31. +1000

[Politicalgolfer]

13. Part that caught my eye.....

.....was the IRS enforcement. Is he or his daughter personally concerned and not just concerned about the donors?

[TeamProg]

15. Go get them Katie! Thank you !! n/t

[BeckyDem]

16. Yep.

[Tommymac]

18. Viruses and Corruption do not recognize party lines.

Just sayin'.

[usaf-vet]

29. Term limits. Term limits. Term limits. This legal bribery has to stop. Nothing else's works.

Separate the bribed individual from the bribing corporations and rich individuals.

The longer they hold offices that can be influenced with legal bribes the worst it gets.

The majority of the American people have no real voice. Sure we can vote. But once they are seated we are only needed when the next elections cycle comes around.

In between election cycles they, for the most part, ONLY bend to the biggest checkbook bribers.

[Kid Berwyn]

33. Taxes scare some people and the corporations they own...

Same for legal responsibility — especially those who damaged the planet’s life support system.

[calimary]

34. Katie Porter. A one-woman bullshit detector.