Petaluma, Calif. – Since 2003, over a dozen federal investigations have uncovered billions of dollars in federal contracts intended for small businesses actually wound up in the hands of Fortune 500 firms.
 
Any plans from President Barack Obama to adopt the recommendation of the Small Business Administration (SBA) Office of Inspector General to address the problem have been conspicuously absent from any of his stimulus plans or proposed policies.

President Obama has also ignored repeated pleas from small business groups around the country to adopt legislation and policies to stop Fortune 500 firms and thousands of other large businesses from commandeering up to $100 billion a year in federal small business contracts.

ABC, CBS and CNN have all released investigative stories on the issue, which found firms such as Lockheed Martin, Wal-Mart, Microsoft, John Deere, Xerox, Dell Computer, Northrop Grumman and Home Depot all received millions of dollars in federal small business contracts.

Even some of the largest firms in Europe such as British Aerospace (BAE), Rolls-Royce and Dutch giant Buhrmann NV have received hundreds of millions a year in U.S. government contracts intended for small businesses.

Thousands of middle class firms have been forced to close their doors as they struggled in vain to compete with Fortune 500 firms for even the smallest government orders for goods and services specifically set-aside for small businesses.

Small business advocates are concerned that President Obama will not only allow federal small business contracts to continue to be diverted to Fortune 500 firms, but that he will support a new federal policy that will create a new loophole in federal law allowing even more government small business contracts to be diverted to firms controlled by some of the nation’s wealthiest investors.

The National Venture Capital Association (NVCA) has contributed millions of dollars to President Obama and key members of Congress, such as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, to try and have federal law changed to allow some of the wealthiest investors in the country to masquerade as small businesses and take billions of dollars in federal contracts designated for legitimate small businesses.

President Obama's appointment of Karen Mills, a multi-millionaire venture capitalist, to the post of Administrator of the SBA is seen by small business groups as a confirmation that President Obama will attempt to create more loopholes in federal contracting law, which will divert more federal small business contracts away from middle class firms and into the hands of wealthy investors.

PETALUMA, Calif., -- On February 22, 2008, Barack Obama released the following statement:

"It is time to end the diversion of federal small business contracts to corporate giants."
(http://www.barackobama.com/2008/02/26/the_american_small_business_le.php)

The statement was made in response to more than 12 federal investigations, which found billions of dollars in federal small business contracts had been diverted to Fortune 500 corporations, their subsidiaries and thousands of other large businesses in the United States and Europe.

Report 5-15 from the Small Business Administration (SBA) Office of Inspector General stated, "One of the most important challenges facing the SBA and the entire Federal government today is that large businesses are receiving small business procurement awards and agencies are receiving credit for these awards." (http://www.sba.gov/IG/05-15.pdf)

Since the exposure of this issue in 2002, nearly every major newspaper in the United States has covered the diversion of federal small business contracts to Fortune 500 firms.

Now, in the face of one of the most catastrophic economic disasters in U.S. history, President-elect Obama has failed to include any provision in his economic stimulus plan to stop the diversion of billions of dollars in federal small business contracts to Fortune 500 firms.

President-elect Obama's refusal to take decisive action to stop the diversion of up to $100 billion a year in federal small business contracts seems to be a direct contradiction to everything he has said about taking "dramatic action" to "put people back to work."

Many of the nation's most respected experts on the economy like Dr. Laura Tyson and Carly Fiorina agree the best way to stimulate our nation's failing economy is to direct federal infrastructure funds to small businesses. Tyson is the former Chair of the U.S. President's Council of Economic Advisers during the Clinton Administration and is currently an economic adviser to President-elect Barack Obama. Fiorina is the former CEO of Hewlett-Packard and McCain campaign economic advisor.

President-elect Obama's refusal to stop the fraud and abuse in federal small business contracting programs will only result in more lost jobs at middle class firms across the nation.

Petaluma, Calif. – The following is a statement from American Small Business League President Lloyd Chapman:

Every day for more than two years President-elect Barack Obama promised voters that if he was elected president, he would enact a windfall profits tax on the oil and gas industry to fund a $1000 per household energy rebate. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QJPo5IGTd0A) 

Just two days after being elected on November 6, President-elect Obama rolled out his transition website, Change.gov, (https://www.asbl.com/documents/Economy_Change.pdf) which contained all of the policies he intended to implement. The top issue under the "Economy" section of the Obama-Biden Agenda was the enactment of a windfall profits tax on the oil and gas industry. Two days later on November 8, the windfall profits tax vanished from the website. To this day, President-elect Obama has never personally offered any justification or rational for the disappearance of one of his biggest campaign promises.

Now, with America in the middle of a historic economic disaster, which could rival the Great Depression, President-elect Obama's windfall profits tax on the oil and gas industry might be the perfect vehicle for funding an economic stimulus plan.

President-elect Obama is now proposing to spend up to one trillion tax dollars to stimulate the nation's failing economy. As opposed to spending approximately $300 billion in taxes to fund a $1000 per household tax rebate, now is the perfect time for President-elect Obama to reconsider the windfall profits tax on the oil and gas industry to help fund an economic stimulus plan. There is no question the oil and gas industry actually did make windfall profits during the last eight years and will almost certainly continue to do so.

The oil and gas industry's windfall profits began early in the Bush Administration.  The Associated Press began reporting on the windfall profits in the oil and gas industry in 2003, when the average price of oil was $30 a barrel. (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A60862-2004Jan29_2.html) 

Since the oil and gas industry has made windfall profits even when the price of oil was as low as $30 dollars a barrel, it is almost certain they will continue to make record profits no matter what the price of oil.

The greed and lack of regulation of the oil and gas industry was obviously a contributing factor to America's current economic crisis. Someone must pay higher taxes eventually to fund the Wall Street bailout, and President-elect Obama's one trillion dollar economic stimulus plan.

The oil and gas industry needs to be controlled in some way. The price of gas at the pump is on the rise again, and more windfall profits at the expense of working families struggling to cope are a virtual certainty.

President-elect Obama's windfall profits tax on the oil and gas industry was a great idea; everyone that voted for him thought so. Now is the time for President-elect Obama to enact the windfall profits tax on the oil and gas industry as he promised during his campaign. It will insure energy prices stay low in relationship to the price of oil, and help fund the economic stimulus plan needed to save our nation's economy from what could be the worst economic disaster in American history.