Baucus blocks Treasury official's nomination over tax collections
Posted on Sept. 29

WASHINGTON - The Treasury Department's new plan for collecting billions in unpaid taxes is not a credible strategy, said a key senator who is holding up a tax official's nomination.

Sen. Max Baucus of Montana, the top Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, said Friday he will not lift his objection to the nomination of Eric Solomon to be deputy treasury secretary for tax policy.

Baucus had been holding up the nomination until the Treasury Department drafted a plan for attacking the annual tax gap. The tax gap measures the amount of taxes owed but not paid, and the IRS's most recent estimate put the figure at $345 billion in 2001.

Baucus said the report that the Treasury Department delivered earlier this week "isn't the complete and credible product that I asked for."

"It lacks the specific benchmarks, timetables, and goals that turn a rote government report into a real strategy," he said.

Baucus said he offered to let the nomination proceed if Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson testified before the Finance Committee in November to fill in some of the details, but the Treasury declined the invitation.

"If the Treasury Department will not or cannot provide these final details, then there's no reason to believe their plan is actionable or real," Baucus said.

Treasury spokesman Sean Kevelighan said the report laid out a comprehensive and integrated strategy for addressing the tax gap, and that "there is no silver bullet" for solving the problem.

Not having Solomon in place "seriously hinders" the department's work toward reducing the tax gap, he said.

The Treasury Department said the details of the report would be filled in as part of President Bush's next budget proposal, to be delivered to Congress early next year.

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