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Income Taxes (Notes)
9 Months Ended
Sep. 30, 2019
Income Tax Disclosure [Abstract]  
Income Tax Disclosure [Text Block]
INCOME TAXES
The Partnership’s effective tax rate differs from the statutory rate primarily due to partnership earnings that are not subject to United States federal and most state income taxes at the partnership level.
ETC Sunoco historically included certain government incentive payments as taxable income on its federal and state income tax returns. In connection with ETC Sunoco’s 2004 through 2011 years, ETC Sunoco filed amended returns with the Internal Revenue Service (“IRS”) excluding these government incentive payments from federal taxable income. The IRS denied the amended returns and ETC Sunoco petitioned the Court of Federal Claims (“CFC”) on this issue. In November 2016, the CFC
ruled against ETC Sunoco, and the Federal Circuit affirmed the CFC’s ruling on November 1, 2018. ETC Sunoco filed a petition for rehearing with the Federal Circuit on December 17, 2018, and this was denied on January 24, 2019. ETC Sunoco filed a petition for writ of certiorari with the United States Supreme Court that was docketed on May 24, 2019, to review the Federal Circuit’s affirmation of the CFC’s ruling. The government filed its response to ETC Sunoco’s petition on July 24, 2019. In October 2019, the Supreme Court denied the petition related to the years 2004 through 2009. The years 2010 through 2011 are on extension with the IRS. Due to the uncertainty surrounding the litigation, a reserve of  $530 million was previously established for the full amount of the pending refund claims, and the receivable and reserve for this issue were netted in the balance sheet. Subsequent to the Supreme Court’s denial of the petition in October 2019, the receivable and reserve have been reversed, with no impact to the Partnership’s financial position or results of operations.