Hillary Clinton says Bill might be useful in White House

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton talks with supporters during a town hall meeting, Wednesday, Dec. 9, 2015, in Waterloo, Iowa. “It’s not only shameful, it’s unsafe”.

Clinton then transitioned to Donald Trump, whose name was met by boos, saying “he does traffic in prejudice and paranoia” by calling for a ban on Muslims entering the United States. Ted Cruz, Sen. Marco Rubio, Ohio Gov. John Kasich, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and Ben Carson.

“I hope the American people know the Federal Bureau of Investigation well enough and the nature and character of this organization”.

To stop or punish companies that more overseas to avoid taxes, Clinton will particularly target “earnings stripping”, the practice where a corporation moves earnings from a country with higher taxes to one with lower taxes, such as Ireland.

Earnings stripping is when a company, through its complex accounting practices, shifts it debt to US soil and its profits overseas to a locale where those profits are taxed at a lower rate.

Though her mention of Trump’s name drew boos from the largely elderly crowd, the audience did not raise the issue of terrorism or the conflict in the Middle East. Instead, questioners focused largely on domestic issues, like climate change, health care and childcare costs — a reflection of the economic concerns that remain central in the Democratic primary battle.

“If you become successful in America”, said Clinton, “if you’ve benefited from American tax dollars and flourished because of all the things that make America great, you should pay what you owe just like everybody else”, she said.

The announcement comes after US pharmaceutical giant Pfizer announced that it will merge with Allergan, becoming an “Irish” company and lowering its USA tax bill.

Earnings stripping is widely used and covers a range of deals that shrink the taxable USA profits of multinational corporations, while still allowing them to take advantage of some US tax deductions.

Clinton also said she wants Congress to stop inversions by requiring that for any merger that a USA company pursues in order to expatriate, the acquiring entity must control a 50 percent stake of the combined company. Clinton has sought to tap into this throughout her campaign, regularly noting that the “the deck is stacked in favor of those already at the top”.