The New York attorney general Eliot Spitzer has come under fire for his strong arm approach to US business, reports said today.
US Chamber of Commerce chief executive Thomas Donohue said tactics used by Spitzer in his crusade against the US insurance industry were tantamount to intimidation.
Donohue said the attorney general's decision to oust former March & McLennan (MMC) chief executive Jeffrey Greenberg “is not the system that that has been put in place in this country and that has protected our individual and institutional liberties.”
In laying out the US Chamber of Commerce lobby agenda for the following year Donohue said it would not go down the road of heavy legislation.
He said tough new rules introduced by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) had cost US companies billions of dollars in compliance costs.
Instead the group, which represents three million companies in the US, said it would concentrate on encouraging the Bush administration that businesses are being penalised over simple and honest mistakes.