Free Republic

Dive Brief: Illinois State Sen. Martin Sandoval has resigned from his position as chair of the State Senate's Transportation Committee amid a federal fraud and corruption investigation related to state construction work, the Associated Press reported. The Democratic senator is still listed as a member of the committee, however, as of Oct. 15. The move came after the details of a federal search warrant revealed that the FBI last month combed Sandoval's offices and home for information related to architect Cesar Santoy; Santoy's architecture firm, Studio ARQ; red-light camera program company SafeSpeed; lobbyists; construction companies; and employees of the Illinois...

INDIANAPOLIS — Maintaining the state’s roads and bridges is work fraught with obstacles and hazards. It doesn’t daunt Ed Soliday, a retired pilot and safety expert who loves telling stories and spinning metaphors. “I’m evangelist, and may 1,000 angels sing when somebody comes to see the light,” said Soliday, Republican chairman of the House Roads and Transportation Committee, who aims to convince fellow lawmakers to set aside politics in search of sustainable road funding. Don’t queue the music just yet. Soliday’s ideas for raising cash for deteriorating roads and bridges include some politically unpalatable proposals, such as tax hikes and...

RICHMOND — A state report linking Virginia cigarette smuggling to terrorist organizations has prompted a Republican state senator to push a bill that would require retailers and wholesalers to obtain a state license to sell cigarettes. The bill, from Sen. Bryce E. Reeves (R-Spottsylvania), has cleared the Senate, but odds are against it in the GOP-dominated House because of conservative objections to increased government regulations and taxes. Even in the more moderate Senate, eight conservative Republicans voted against it. They are a group that Reeves, a fiscal and social conservative, often votes with. “I think they are concerned about regulatory...

Did New York kill black market cigarette dealer Eric Garner over lost cigarette tax revenue? Yes. His was a senseless killing, of course. Garner shouldn't have died. He shouldn't have resisted arrest. And he shouldn't have been choked by New York police, who inhumanely ignored his pleas for help and used a procedure that violated department rules. But it seems to me that Garner's death is being absorbed by the usual litany of race and politics, diluted and obscured, so we have difficulty seeing another explanation for what happened here. Garner died because he dared interfere with government reach and...

NYPD sources confirm that Eric Garner was a player in an organized crime cigarette smuggling syndicate, Gotnews.com has learned.(snip) “Garner was setting up shop in front of the local stores and shaking down business owners and patrons as they entered,” says Cardillo. Garner would use his considerable size to strong arm largely ethnic shopkeepers and was “on the radar” of local law enforcement who had arrested him previously.

BOISE, Idaho — Millions in tax revenue from Idaho's cigarette sales is closer to flowing toward the state's scarred-up highway asphalt and its drought-depleted aquifers. The House voted 63-4 on Friday to redirect cash from the state's 56 cent-per-pack tax — it has totaled about $35 million to $40 million annually — that's currently being used to retire bonds for the $130 million Idaho Capitol renovation, as well as funding cancer programs, state buildings and juvenile probation. With the Capitol bonds nearly paid off, there's been a scramble this session for the money that's no longer needed.

Mayor Rahm Emanuel agreed Monday to shave a quarter off his 75-cents-a-pack tax on cigarettes to appease African-American aldermen concerned about the illegal sale of loose cigarettes. The decision to reduce the tax from 75 cents a pack to 50 cents continues Emanuel’s pattern of tinkering at the margins of his city budgets to appease critics without giving away too much............. ........Last week, the mayor appeared to slam the door on compromise. He called the 75-cents-a-pack increase that would have left Chicago with the nation’s highest combined state and local tax on cigarettes a “health care feat” on par with...

President Obama’s plan to raise the federal cigarette tax by 94 cents a pack would put 2 million low and middle-income kids through preschool, a new report has concluded. Obama’s fiscal 2014 budget proposal calls for a near doubling of the tax, from $1.01 to $1.95 per pack, with the proceeds going toward an expansion of early childhood education. Taxes on other tobacco products would increase proportionally, bringing the estimated additional revenue to an estimated $78 billion over the next decade.“Taken together, these two measures would help ensure a future of smart, healthy kids nationwide and in every state,” according...

Cigarette taxes turn a frowned-upon habit into a popular revenue source. But a recent study found that cigarette taxes often lead to other tax hikes later. The National Taxpayers Union found a 70 percent chance that the so-called sin taxes will not produce the expected revenue, as people buy fewer packs. The taxpayer advocate organization reported that from 2007 to 2011, 25 of 37 cigarette tax increases were joined by other new tax hikes within two years.

The Obama budget is finally out and there are, to no surprise, a potpourri of new tax hikes proposed, many of which are aimed at the "wealthy" among us. Deep within the bowels of the colossal budget, however, lies a proposed tax that targets the poor among us and it is perhaps a precursor of other health-related taxes to come. President Obama proposes raising the tax on cigarettes from $1.01 to $1.95 per pack--a whopping 93% increase in taxes. The White House estimates that the tax would raise $78.1 billion, of which around $66 billion would be used to fund...

President's Obama's call for a 94-cent-a-pack hike on federal cigarette taxes to fund early childhood education programs is controversial. Anti-smoking groups applaud the proposal, but some tax experts and tobacco companies are against it. The case for the tax. The tax is being presented as way to fund education and reduce smoking rates. It would raise roughly $78 billion over 10 years. "The proposed tobacco tax increase would have substantial public health benefits, particularly for young Americans," the president's budget read. "Researchers have found that raising taxes on cigarettes significantly reduces consumption, with especially large effects on youth smoking." After...

Obama’s former chief economist Larry Summers thinks that one way to break America’s fall off the over-reported fiscal cliff is to raise taxes to the level they were under Clinton’s administration. Echoing Paul Krugman’s 90% tax rate nostalgia and pointing out that it was conservative icon Ronald Reagan who cut taxes to 50%, he said, “It’s hard to believe that raising the top tax rate to 39.6 percent — where it was under President Clinton — will do grievous damage to the economy.” Of course, Reagan also cut the top tax rate to 28% in his second term, but that’s...

Not content with masterminding Obamacare, which taxes, regulates, and disincentivizes the healthcare industry into nothing more than a capitulatory utility under government control, Democrat Senator Max Baucus used the recently passed transportation bill as the vehicle to exterminate thousands of jobs with the stroke of Barack Obama’s pen. In addition to the $400 million the senator earmarked for his state’s highway system, the Montana senator mischievously added a separate and unrelated special interest earmark to the transportation bill as a nod to his Big Tobacco benefactors at Altria, a parent company of tobacco giant Philip Morris. How did he appease...

ANNAPOLIS — Maryland health advocates are celebrating an upcoming tax increase on cigars and smokeless tobacco, but they aren’t stopping there. Gov. Martin O'Malley, a Democrat, is expected to sign a bill Tuesday that will raise the state’s tax on non-cigarette tobacco products for the first time since 1999, in an effort to combat what state health officials say is increased use of the products among teens. The measure is part of $260 million in tax increases that were approved during last week’s special session and will be signed into law Tuesday. About $247 million of the increases will come...

A Maryland health advocate who fought successfully this year for an increase in the state’s alcohol sales tax is pushing for a tax increase on cigarettes. Vincent DeMarco, president of the Maryland Citizens’ Health Initiative, says the group will start a campaign next week asking the General Assembly to increase the state’s $2-a-pack tax on cigarettes to $3 and raise taxes on other tobacco products, including cigars and smokeless tobacco. Mr. DeMarco — a health lobbyist who has long championed so-called “sin taxes” on tobacco and alcohol — hopes to build on momentum from this year’s assembly, in which legislators...

As states around the country continue to face ongoing projected budget deficits, many elected officials are advocating consumption tax hikes in an effort to close budget holes (see Dayton, Mark and Democrats, Minnesota). However, New Hampshire recently cut its cigarette tax in a move to increase revenue and now Michigan—the state generally regarded as having the worst economy in the country—may follow suit. Senate Bill 517 would roll back the $2 per pack cigarette excise tax, among the highest in the nation, and reset it at $1 per pack. It would be partnered with budget cuts including an option that...

TUSCARORA INDIAN NATION, N.Y., Sept. 16 (UPI) -- An American Indian tribe told motorists it may collect tolls from cars to protest a court decision giving New York the right to tax the tribe's cigarette sales. "It's not just about taxes," a member of the Tuscarora tribe told The Buffalo (N.Y.) News. "This is about our freedom and our human rights. We're supposed to be a sovereign nation, and yet the state keeps trying to tax us." Several dozen members of the Iroquoian-language-family tribe carrying signs and flags stopped passing cars on a two-lane state highway and handed fliers to...

Chicago loses an estimated $120 million a year — and the U.S. billions — on uncollected taxes on cigarettes. But that could change with the Sept. 2 sale of a little-known Illinois company that produces cigarette tax stamps that are used throughout the country. States have struggled for more than a half-century to control rampant cigarette tax evasion, the result of stamp counterfeiting, cross-border smuggling, sales of unstamped products and other illegal activity.

RETAIL chains were reporting an unprecedented rush on cigarettes last night ahead of Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's 25 per cent price rise, with some doubling their daily sales within a matter of hours. One woman was refused service at a Woolworths in the Canberra suburb of Belconnen after trying to buy $5000 worth of cigarettes before the midnight deadline. She was knocked back because Woolworths imposes a limit of five cartons per person. Another Canberra Woolworths store reported sales of $23,000 by 6.30pm yesterday - the supermarket's average daily tobacco turnover is $10,000.

SMOKERS may pay an extra $6.50 for a packet of 30 cigarettes to help foot the bill for Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's $18 billion health reforms. The Government's National Preventative Health Taskforce has called for the tax rise in next month's Budget and the soon-to-be-released Henry tax review also examines the option. A tobacco tax rise could raise two-thirds of the $3 billion Mr Rudd needs to fund the sweeteners he has offered the states to endorse his healthcare reforms. Up to three million smokers would be hit if the price of a pack of 30 cigarettes rose from about...