COMMENTARY: Illinois legislature considering allowing tax bills to be paid with cryptocurrency

A recent topic of discussion in the Illinois House may become a point of discussion in next week’s scheduled hearing of the House Revenue and Finance Committee, slated for 3:00 p.m. on Wednesday, April 11.

What is this point of discussion, you ask?

A proposed bill filed by Democratic state representative Michael Zalewski (also the chair of mentioned committee), House Bill 5335, may allow for the payment of tax bills with cryptocurrency, but there is much confusion from the vague language presented in the bill.

So I proceeded to contact who I could on the committee via email — Chairman Zalewski, Rep. David Harris, Marcus C. Evans Jr., Robert Martwick, David McSweeney, Brian W. Stewart, Arthur Turner and Emanuel Chris Welch — whose email addresses were public on the Illinois General Assembly website. Three committee members — Barbara Flynn Currie, Robert Rita and Joe Sosnowski — were unable to be contacted due to lack of contact information.

Considering I sent the following email late Wednesday night, I haven’t received a response, but anxiously await further clarification of the intent of this bill, with attached language included below.

[pdf-embedder url=”http://heartlandnewsfeed.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/10000HB5335lv.pdf”]

So my concerns regarding the bill is that it allows for a 24-hour window for the treasurer, deputy treasurer or tax agent to convert the cryptocurrency to the U.S. dollar when the markets are volatile and that currency could lose value within that window.

If someone pays their tax bill in full with Bitcoin (BTC) — and I included values as of 8:00 PM Wednesday night in the email — and the market plummets on the three major world exchanges, are they going to turn around and claim the tax wasn’t paid in full when there’s a print copy and digital footprint in the blockchain citing that the bill was paid when BTC was at a specific value. (Let’s use the $6,705.06 value from last night.) Say the value dropped $800 overnight due to “whales” in the Asian marketplace decided to sell.

So my essential question was whether they’re (or some other governmental body) are going to claim I didn’t pay my entire tax bill when they were negligent in their duties to convert as quickly as possible.

I anticipate their response via email and if not then, their response during their hearing.

Please note: I didn’t redact anything from this email, because I am always a strong believer in transparency. I will provide a follow-up to this commentary as responses come in. The email was also forwarded to The Sovereignty Network and Kurt Wuckert Jr. from Crypto Traders News, both of which cover news regarding cryptocurrency.

[pdf-embedder url=”http://heartlandnewsfeed.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/Correspondence-with-ILHouse-RevenueFinance-Committee-HB5335.pdf” title=”Correspondence with ILHouse RevenueFinance Committee HB5335″]

Jake Leonard

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Jake Leonard, a broadcast media and journalism veteran, is the editor-in-chief of Heartland Newsfeed. Leonard is also GM and program director of Heartland Newsfeed Radio Network, wrestling editor and contributing writer for Ambush Sports, a contributing writer for My Sports Vote and Midwest Sports Network, and a former contributor to Bleacher Report and Overtime Heroics. He resides at home in Nokomis, Ill. with his dog Buster.

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