Category → Lawmakers
House passes payroll tax break extension
Senate Majority Leader Harry
Reid (D-Nev.) said that the Republican proposal to extend the payroll tax cut for another year was 'dead before it got to the Senate'. Photo: Robyn Beck/AFP/Getty Images.
The House of Representatives passed Republican legislation to extend the payroll tax bill on Tuesday. However, within minutes of the votes, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) warned that the bill was nothing more than “a pointless partisan exercise.” He also added that he thought the bill “was dead on arrival in the Senate. It was dead before it got to the Senate.” A Democrat bill proposing to offset the cost of the payroll tax break with a surtax on incomes exceeding $1 million was rejected on the same day.
Capitol Hill to crack down on insider trading
Robert Khuzami is the director of the Division of Enforcement of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission .
Legislators in both houses are considering tightening rules on lawmakers’ and congressional aides’ stock trading activities in an effort to restore faith in Congress. They are particularly interested in making insider trading unlawful. The practice involves buying or selling stocks after receiving information which has the potential to affect stock prices but which is not yet available to the general public.