Senator Bernie Sanders speaks on the Senate floor about deficit reduction and corporate tax rates, April 24, 2013.

Profitable American companies paid just 12.6 percent of their profits in federal income taxes in 2010 -- well below the 35 percent federal corporate income tax rate, according to a new study by the Government Accountability Office.

“At a time when corporate America and their allies in Congress are demanding lower tax rates, this report clearly shows that many multi-national corporations are currently paying very little in taxes,” Sanders said. “In fact, some very profitable corporations like General Electric and Bank of America have, in some recent years, actually paid nothing in federal income taxes. As a result of absurd tax policy, large corporations and the wealthy are avoiding more than $100 billion in taxes each and every year by stashing their cash in the Cayman Islands and other offshore tax havens.”

Senator Sanders authored legislation, the Corporate Tax Fairness Act, to stop profitable corporations from sheltering income. The bill would generate more than $590 billion in revenue over the next decade and stop the federal government from giving tax breaks to corporations that ship American jobs overseas and shift their profits to offshore tax havens.