 merrie says: Among the recipients of Mr. Stanford's largesse is House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charles Rangel (D., N.Y.), who has long advocated lenient tax policies toward Virgin Islands residents and in 2007 introduced a bill to enforce a statute of limitations on IRS scrutiny of islanders' old tax returns. That year, Mr. Rangel traveled to Antigua for a development conference partly sponsored by Mr. Stanford, who also donated $28,300 to Mr. Rangel in 2008. He also was a big supporter of New York Democrat Gregory Meeks, a member of a House Financial Services subcommittee dealing with offshore banks that received an estimated $17,600 from a Stanford fund-raiser held in the Virgin Islands in July. Mr. Meeks's campaign later reimbursed the organizers of the event $3,591 for the cost of food and beverages, according to the campaign's financial disclosures. . . . Influential Democratic lobbyist and fund-raiser Ben Barnes of Texas is among Mr. Stanford's roster of advocates, lobbying records show, with $1.125 million in fees over the past two years. In his lobby filings for Stanford Financial Group, Mr. Barnes states that he works on "economic development in the Caribbean, specifically the Virgin Islands." The tax law on which Mr. Sanford is lobbying, which allows Virgin Islands residents to pay an effective rate of 3.5%, is construed by the territories as an economic-development measure. Offshore Income In an interview, Mr. Barnes said he assisted Mr. Stanford in setting up a government-relations office in Washington on various Caribb... |
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