January 27,2025

Wyden Statement Opposing Bessent Confirmation

As Prepared for Delivery

The Senate will vote shortly on the nomination of Scott Bessent for Treasury Secretary. I urge my colleagues to oppose his confirmation. 

A few reasons why.  First off the list, nearly a million dollars in unpaid Medicare taxes.

For the vast majority of Americans, paying Medicare taxes is automatic. They come straight out of every paycheck. Not so for individuals like Mr. Bessent -- those at the very top who operate under a different set of tax rules than everybody else.

Mr. Bessent comes from Wall Street. To opt out of paying his fair share into Medicare, he follows a tax dodge that’s common among ultra-wealthy hedge fund managers.

They spend top-dollar to hire the best tax lawyers and accountants. They mash together loopholes and twist the law until -- poof -- their Medicare taxes almost disappear. Mr. Bessent has avoided paying almost a million dollars in the three years of tax returns the Finance Committee reviewed. There could be a lot more in other years.

Now, the Treasury Department says that what he’s doing is a violation of the law. The IRS has gone to court twice to close this loophole -- and it won both times.

We raised this with Mr. Bessent and urged him to pay what he owes. He said no, he’s going to wait out the appeal process -- running down the clock in the hopes that he’ll never have to pay.

So if Mr. Bessent is confirmed, the day he’s sworn in, the Treasury Secretary will be in violation of Treasury policy. It’s an absurd double standard to maintain for the benefit of one individual with immense economic power.

It raises the question -- is he going to change Treasury’s position on this issue, enriching himself and other Wall Street billionaires? Or will the Treasury and IRS continue to enforce its policy for all taxpayers EXCEPT the sitting Treasury Secretary?

This was not the only tax issue we identified in Mr. Bessent’s returns. There were questionable losses from side businesses and a questionable debt writeoff. We asked for documentation to prove that Mr. Bessent was following the law and paying what he owed. He didn’t provide it.

The reality is, what Mr. Bessent owes in Medicare taxes is a trivial amount of money to someone with his wealth. He could do the right thing and pay, and he wouldn’t even notice any difference. It’s routine for nominees that come through the Finance Committee to have to resolve the tax issues we spot in the vetting process. Mr. Bessent has refused.

Second issue with the Bessent nomination. He was the most unprepared Treasury nominee I recall meeting in all my time on the Finance Committee. Trump’s top economic priority in his second term is a tax bill. Mr. Bessent struggled to answer basic tax policy questions in one-on-one meetings and in his committee hearing.

I asked him a simple policy question -- should wages be treated differently than wealth?

When senators talk about the unfairness of our tax system, this is really the center of the debate. It’s a question of whether the ultra-wealthy should get a better deal than people who work for a living. Mr. Bessent fumbled and sputtered for a minute until he basically said, that’s just the way it is.

Senator Hassan asked him about R&D incentives, a top priority for lots of members on both sides. He couldn’t answer.

Senator Bennet asked about the unfairness of making cuts that will hurt working families and raise the cost of living while Trump’s also running up deficits with tax breaks for the top. Again, Mr. Bessent didn’t have an answer.

Senator Warnock and Senator Warren asked about the wastefulness of giving tax breaks to individuals with incomes over a million, a billion, ten billion. Mr. Bessent dodged.

Senator Lujan asked about Trump cutting Medicaid. It wasn’t clear whether Mr. Bessent knew what Medicaid was.

Nobody expects nominees to be walking encyclopedias on every last policy question under the sun. But Mr. Bessent’s performance was a new low when it comes to these basic policy matters that are going to be at the center of the debate -- and the center of his job -- for the next few years.

Even worse, I asked Mr. Bessent a simple question about Trump’s tariffs. Who will pay them, Americans or foreigners?

Mr. Bessent responded with a convoluted, academic answer that covered for Trump, who routinely lies and says Americans won’t get hit at all. That was the gist of Mr. Bessent’s response.

We’re one week into Trump’s second term, and already he’s gunning for a trade war. This is guaranteed to clobber American consumers and small businesses, including a lot of farmers and ranchers.

If anybody out there was looking for evidence that Mr. Bessent would be a check on Trump’s worst instincts on tariffs and other economic policies, it’s not looking good.

Third reason why I oppose this nomination -- Mr. Bessent is already blowing off Congressional oversight.

I’ll walk through the background on this. During the presidential campaign, a longtime Trump advisor named Boris Epshteyn ran a quid-pro-quo scheme. He approached people who wanted cabinet appointments, and he said he’d push Trump to nominate them in exchange for payments adding up to hundreds of thousands of dollars. Mr. Bessent was among the people that Trump advisor Boris Epshteyn spoke to, according to news reports.

When the Finance Committee read about this scheme, it was clear we needed more information. We sent the Trump transition letters with a few key questions. We got no response.

I asked Mr. Bessent about it in our one-on-one meeting. He confirmed that Mr. Epshteyn spoke with him about payments for “public relations” -- a sleazy way for somebody in Trump’s inner circle to pitch an obvious quid-pro-quo.

Mr. Bessent’s story then changed in response to a written question. His new answer is, nobody ever asked him about payments in exchange for an appointment. And even though the committee knows there was an internal investigation into Epshteyn’s conduct, Mr. Bessent still won’t reveal who else in Trump’s orbit he talked to about it.

Colleagues, it has never been more important for the Senate to stand up and fight for Congressional oversight.

Late on Friday night, Trump fired 17 inspectors general, the independent watchdogs we rely on to identify and combat waste, fraud and abuse in the executive branch. The Treasury inspector general was reportedly one of the 17.

This midnight massacre was obviously an illegal act by the Trump administration. The courts must strike it down immediately. Regardless of what happens next, it’s obvious that Trump wants to eliminate anybody who will stand up to corruption and call it out.

As a major Trump donor and a cabinet nominee, Mr. Bessent is volunteering to walk right into the culture of corruption that defines Trump and his administration. For Mr. Bessent to be shirking oversight by Congress before he’s even confirmed is totally unacceptable.

So colleagues, for those three reasons I will oppose Mr. Bessent’s confirmation.

Mr. Bessent has cheated on his taxes, according to Treasury policy. It’d be a huge double standard, and a conflict of interest, if he’s confirmed and maintains his position that he doesn’t have to pay.

Mr. Bessent appeared to be deeply unprepared on many of the biggest policy questions he’s going to face if he’s confirmed. I didn’t even get the impression that he studied up to talk with Senators about the issues they care about. That’s the easiest part of the nomination process.

And Mr. Bessent is already showing that he has little respect for Congressional oversight. The Trump administration wants to blind us to the corruption that’s already going on behind closed doors, but we don’t have to accept it.

I urge my colleagues to oppose the Bessent nomination.

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