Sen. Levin praise Swiss decision on tax evasion

Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) on Thursday praised Swiss lawmakers for deciding to hand over 4,450 names of U.S. taxpayers suspected of opening UBS bank accounts to hide money from the Internal Revenue Service. 

The U.S. and the Swiss reached an agreement on this issue back in August of 2009. 

"The next step is for the Swiss to turn over the names and for the Department of Justice to take action against the thousands of U.S. tax dodgers who tried to offload their tax burden onto the backs of honest taxpayers," Levin said in prepared remarks. "So far less than two dozen prosecutions have been announced; the IRS and the DOJ need to intensify their efforts to bring these offshore tax cheats to justice." 

Levin also called on Congress to move legislation the clamps down on offshore tax avoidance, like the Stop Tax Haven Abuse Act which the senator sponsored. The bill authorizes the U.S. Treasury to take action against any foreign bank that impedes U.S. tax enforcement. 

"The new authority would enable Treasury, for example, to prohibit U.S. banks from accepting wire transfers or honoring credit cards from a foreign bank found to be facilitating U.S. tax evasion," Levin said. 

The Swiss bank has admitted to helping thousands of U.S. taxpayers hide roughly $20 billion of income from the IRS. Levin hopes today's decision means the bank will no longer facilitate tax evasion.