Industry lobbyists are pushing Congress to expand Covid-19 relief tax breaks that provided a liquidity bump to some of the nation’s largest retailers, as the pandemic has shuttered long-struggling shopping malls across the U.S.
The lobbying push comes as dozens of retail chains—such as Urban Outfitters, Abercrombie & Fitch, Gap, and Express—have disclosed benefits from the CARES Act (Public Law 116-136), in some cases totaling hundreds of millions of dollars. The typical fixtures of American malls often took advantage of a provision allowing companies to carry losses back to earlier years to trigger refunds ...