Senate Breaks Tax Bill Deadlock; Legislation Approved to Cut Corporate Taxes, End Trade Dispute
The Senate yesterday broke a two-month deadlock and approved a major corporate tax bill that would end a trade dispute with Europe and shower U.S. corporations with billions in new tax breaks.</br></br>The bill, approved 92 to 5, would provide $170 billion in corporate tax cuts over the next decade to replace export subsidies previously granted to U.S. firms by Congress that prompted $4 billion in retaliatory tariffs by the European Union.</br></br>A different House version of the legislation has been stalled for months by disagreements among Republicans. But key senators said they believe Senate passage would help break the House logjam in time for enactment of the legislation later this year, and several House aides said they agreed with this assessment.</br></br>The Senate impasse ended after Democrats consented to limit debate in exchange for an agreement from Republicans to allow a vote on extending supplementary unemployment benefits for 13 weeks, an election-year priority for the Democrats.</br></br>But the vote on the unemployment measure turned into an embarrassment for Sen. John F. Kerry (Mass.), the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee. The Senate voted 59 to 40 for the proposal, one vote short of the 60 needed for approval. Kerry, who favored extending jobless benefits, was campaigning in Kentucky and was the only senator to miss the vote.