Simon Property Group Sues Indiana Over Sales Tax Fairness

Late last week, Simon Property Group, the largest mall owner in the country, filed a lawsuit against the state of Indiana in an effort to get the state to require Amazon.com to collect and remit sales tax on orders by Indiana residents.

Simon Property Group (SPG) said that it was not seeking monetary damages, but filed the suit “to benefit all of Indiana’s taxpayers and the state’s bricks-and-mortar retailers, many of which are SPG’s tenants at its 27 shopping centers in Indiana.”

At present, Amazon.com has three warehouses in Indiana and in July announced plans to open a 900,000-square-foot fulfillment center in Plainfield, Indiana, as reported by Auctionbytes.com [1]. Five years ago, Amazon made a deal to build warehouses in Indiana if the state would exempt Amazon from collecting and remitting sales tax, as reported by the Clinton Herald [2]. The deal has cost the state’s treasury between $200 million to $400 million in revenues annually, according to state Sen. Luke Kenley, head of the state senate’s appropriations committee, as reported by the Herald.

In its press release, SPG noted: “Amazon.com is required by Indiana law to collect and remit sales and use taxes to the state for sales made over the Internet, but [it] has consistently refused to do so even though it is required by current Indiana laws…. Simon Property Group believes we have a responsibility to ensure the laws are equally applied to everyone. Main Street retailers are being harmed by this unequal playing field in Indiana and their existence is being jeopardized and threatens the employment of hundreds of thousands of retail employees in our state.”