Yesterday, Harry Reid’s secret source came forward to confirm that – as the Democratic Senate Majority Leader asserted – U.S. presidential candidate Mitt Romney has not paid taxes in ten years. “Could be more like zwagzig or vierzig years,” recalled the source slipping into her native Swiss German language. “They are like Swiss cheese, his taxes.”
A former offshore bank consultant, Heidi Svenda Bernasconi met Romney in Switzerland in 2008 at UBS where he was keeping his secret Swiss bank account. “But what is the – - how do you say – ‘big deal’?” said Miss Bernasconi. “Rich people pay lawyers and accountants not taxes,” said Miss Bernasconi. “Why would they pay taxes when they go to private schools, fly in their own airplanes, and drink bottled water?”
Miss Bernasconi – originally from Ostermundigen, Switzerland – is the three time winner of the prestigious Miss Swiss Bank Account pageant. Miss Bernasconi is the daughter of a Nestle Chocolate factory worker and a regionally respected Cuckoo clock maker. She considered going into the family’s clock business, but after Harvard Business School and a summer internship at JPMorgan Chase, she changed her mind. She worked as a tax consultant for offshore bank accounts at UBS in Geneva, Switzerland from 2008-2010 where she met Mr. Romney. She described her first encounter with the presidential candidate as, “More fun than milking cows – he came to the bank throwing $100 bills in the air shouting ‘Thank God for Amnesty!’ It was really quite festive.”
Their relationship continued – in a purely platonic fashion according to Miss Bernasconi – over several years. “Mitty would come to Switzerland to deposit money. He would cry to me about how unfair it was that he had to pay the same tax rate as a single mother who makes $33,000 a year when he has so much more money than she does. To make him feel better, I used to take him to Olga’s Beauty Salon for mani/pedis and then go have hot chocolate even though that is a ‘no no’ for the Mormons.”
Miss Bernasconi moved to Searchlight, Nevada in 2011 where she met Senator Reid at a sheep shearing contest. “We were out late one night, shearing sheep and blowing alphorns when I told Senator Reid about Romney’s tax returns. He nearly nicked the ear off a calf he was buzzing when he heard about it! I thought it was funny! That is why I told him! Everyone knows that rich people do not pay taxes. I didn’t think he would get so mad about it and then go and tell everyone.”
When asked why she was coming forward now, Miss Bernasconi said, “I do not like Mr. Reid anymore than I like poor people, but he is telling the truth.”
“You Americans are such sticklers for everyone ‘doing their share,’” said Miss Heidi Svenda Bernasconi, “I don’t even understand this word – share – what do you mean like the stocks or something?”
By stepping forward Miss Bernasconi has put herself in the middle of a political war. After Senator Reid revealed on the Senate floor last week that Mr. Romney had paid no taxes, Mr. Romney told the Majority Leader to ‘put up or shut up.’ Most recently, RNC Chairman Reince Priebus called Senator Harry Reid “a dirty liar,” Senator Graham said Reid was “making things up” to “divert the campaign away from the real issues,” and Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell, also a Republican, said Reid had made a “reckless and slanderous charge.”
To date, Romney has yet to release a single full tax return and refuses to disclose any information about his other off-shore accounts. He has also not said whether he participated in the IRS special tax amnesty program in 2009, after it was discovered that thousands of American clients had been hiding their money in the Swiss branch of UBS bank to avoid paying U.S. taxes. Rumors abound that the reason Mr. Romney has not released any tax returns from the years before 2010 is because he does not want to reveal taking advantage of the 2009 amnesty program.
“Mr. Romney told me once that when he was little he loved firehouses because he thought that was where you fired people. When he got older he learned that is not true. When he is President of the most powerful country in the world, he will get to fire people all the time. He can also bomb them and throw them into the jail if they complain. This will make him happy,” said Miss Bernasconi. “Not so happy that he will pay his taxes… but pretty happy.”
