Trump keeps insisting Amazon does not collect sales tax — but his own company's online store does so in only 2 states

pulse

April 8, 2018 10:56 PM

One of President Donald Trump's most frequent attacks on Amazon is accusing the company of not collecting sales taxes.

President Donald Trump has blasted Amazon over the issue of sales-tax collection by online retailers.
Amazon collects sales tax in the 45 states that have such a tax.
The Trump Organization's online store collects the tax in just two states.
Online retailers are not legally required to collect the taxes unless they have a physical presence in the state.

One of President Donald Trump's most frequent attacks on Amazon is accusing the company of not collecting state and local sales taxes. But that is something his own business' online store does in just two states.

TrumpStore.com, the Trump Organization's online retailer, collects sales taxes from purchasers who ship orders to Louisiana and Florida addresses, The Wall Street Journal reported.

Amazon, the e-commerce giant that has found itself in Trump's crosshairs this month, originally collected sales taxes in just five states. But the company has more recently moved to collect sales taxes from consumers in the 45 states that have such taxes, as well as Washington, DC.

"Trumpstore.com has always, and will continue to collect, report, and remit sales taxes in jurisdictions where it has an obligation to do so," a Trump Organization representative told CNBC.

Amazon's collection of sales taxes in those 45 states is not required by law. Online retails are obliged to collect the taxes only in states where they have a physical presence. The Supreme Court is hearing arguments in a case on the subject later this month after the Trump administration filed a brief with the high court in March. The administration argued that retailers like Amazon had to collect the tax in states where they do not have a physical location.

Trump has repeatedly targeted the sales-tax issue as a way to go after Amazon. The White House has said Trump is referring to third-party sellers on the platform when discussing the collection of sales taxes, not the company itself, which does collect those taxes on its own inventory.

In tweeting about the issue, Trump said that "fully tax paying retailers are closing stores all over the country...not a level playing field!"

"Unlike others, they pay little or no taxes to state & local government," he said in another recent tweet, adding in a subsequent post that Amazon "must pay real costs (and taxes) now!"

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