{"id":7101,"date":"2014-08-26T14:43:44","date_gmt":"2014-08-26T18:43:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chescotimes.com\/?p=7101"},"modified":"2014-08-26T14:43:09","modified_gmt":"2014-08-26T18:43:09","slug":"gop-officials-blast-wolf-on-tax-returns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/?p=7101","title":{"rendered":"GOP officials blast Wolf on tax returns"},"content":{"rendered":"

Farrell, Welsh and DiGiorgio call for 10 years of returns to be released<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

By Mike McGann<\/strong>, Editor, The Times<\/em><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"GOPHitsWolf\"<\/a>

County Commssioner Terence Farrell criticizes Democratic gubernatorial candidate Tom Wolf for failing to release the last 10 years of tax returns as well as records relating to his business as Sheriff Carolyn Bunny Welsh and GOP party chair Val DiGiorgio look on, Tuesday.<\/p><\/div>\n

WEST CHESTER \u2014 A number of Chester County\u2019s leading Republicans gathered Tuesday on the old county Courthouse steps with a simple request: that Democratic gubernatorial candidate Tom Wolf release his tax returns for the last decade.<\/p>\n

County GOP Committee Chair Val DiGiorgio was joined by Sheriff Carolyn \u201cBunny\u201d Welsh and County Commissioner Terence Farrell \u2014 who blasted Wolf over his tax returns, the low rate of tax he\u2019s paid and for maintaining his company \u2014 which builds kitchen cabinets \u2014 as a Delaware corporation since regaining control over in it 2009.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt seems Secretary Wolf has one set of rules for himself and another for everyone else,\u201d said DiGiorgio, referring specifically to a Wolf tax proposal that would lead wealthier Pennsylvanians to ultimately pay more in income tax. DiGiorgio \u2014 aided by large graphic panels behind the podium set up on the steps \u2014 pointed out that wold has paid about 8% in taxes, while the average resident of the state pays 18%. With his company incorporated in Delaware, it pays no taxes to Pennsylvania, he noted.<\/p>\n

A Wolf spokesman, Mark Nicastre, rejected the entire argument, saying that both Wolf and the Wolf Organization had made its returns and financial information available and suggested that Republicans and the Corbett campaign were grasping at straws to attempt to change the conversation \u2014 and avoid allegations that former Education Secretary Ronald Tomalis was given a no-show job after his ouster from Corbett\u2019s cabinet.<\/p>\n

\u201cTom Wolf has released his personal income taxes and financial information from the Wolf Organization – a privately held company,\u201d Nicastre said.\u00a0\u201cTom Corbett is trying to distract from scandals that have engulfed his administration. In the past month, Corbett has come under fire for holding campaign meetings in his government office, keeping a ghost employee on staff, and deleting thousands of emails in a likely violation of the state’s open records law.\u201d<\/p>\n

Local Republicans say they don\u2019t buy that argument, and that Wolf has only released data from the past couple of years. DiGiorgio, Welsh and Farrell said that Wolf should release the last 10 years of his personal tax returns and open the books of the Wolf Organization.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is consistent with what other candidates have done,\u201d DiGiorgio said, noting a long list of Pennsylvania Democrats who called on Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney to release his tax returns in 2012, including former Gov. Ed Rendell.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat is he hiding?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n

Farrell made a point of arguing that Wolf was exploiting the \u201cDelaware Loophole\u201d at a time when the state\u2019s finances are hurting \u2014 the state had to close a budget deficit in this year\u2019s budget as revenue fell below projections.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s had five years to reorganize in Pennsylvania,\u201d Farrell said. \u201c\u201dIt\u2019s time for him to pay his fair share in Pennsylvania.\u201d<\/p>\n

Welsh said it is a matter of fairness \u2014 pointing out again, that the three years of data released by Wolf show him to have paid just 8%. She cited middle class families \u2014 who may end up paying more in taxes if Wolf is elected, she said \u2014 as already paying a larger share of their income in taxes than Wolf, based on the limited returns he\u2019s released. She asked if the previous years painted an even worse picture \u2014 as a possible motivation for keeping wraps on the returns.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy won\u2019t Tom Wolf release his returns?\u201d Welsh asked. \u201cWe have a right to ask questions.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Farrell, Welsh and DiGiorgio call for 10 years of returns to be released By Mike McGann, Editor, The Times WEST CHESTER \u2014 A number of Chester County\u2019s leading Republicans gathered Tuesday on the old county Courthouse steps with a simple request: that Democratic gubernatorial candidate Tom Wolf release his tax returns for the last decade. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7100,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,7],"tags":[138,2987,4427,3289,3112],"class_list":["post-7101","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-featured","tag-chester-county","tag-gop","tag-tax-returns","tag-tom-corbett","tag-tom-wolf"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7101","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7101"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7101\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/7100"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7101"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7101"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7101"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}