Category: US Senate

DFL Chairman Ken Martin Statement on GOP Tax Plan

Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor (DFL) Party Chairman Ken Martin today released the following statement on Congressional Republicans newly released tax plan.

“We need a simpler, fairer tax code for all Minnesotans. The plan Republicans released today is not that. By limiting a major tax deduction that families depend on every year, it could cost thousands of dollars for nearly a million Minnesota taxpayers. It will take away other critical deductions that help Minnesotans afford college, offset the cost of medical expenses, and purchase a new home. Meanwhile, the wealthiest Americans receive massive handouts and the federal budget is decimated.”

“Republican Representatives Tom Emmer, Jason Lewis, and Erik Paulsen have a duty to stand against this disastrous plan that disproportionally hurts their constituents in Minnesota.”

The tax plan released today limits the State and Local Tax (SALT) Deduction, which provides an average $12,000 tax deduction for 900,000 primarily middle-class Minnesota families and results in about $12 billion in tax benefits to Minnesotans every year.

  • 42 percent of taxpayers in Lewis’ district claimed the SALT deduction last year for nearly $1.8 billion in federal tax relief.
  • 40 percent of taxpayers in Paulsen’s district claimed the SALT deduction last year for nearly $1.7 billion in federal tax relief.
  • 40 percent of taxpayers in Emmer’s district claimed the SALT deduction last year for nearly $2.5 billion in federal tax relief.

Blue states already subsidize red states. Now red states want even more.

The following article by Prof. Bruce J. Schulman was posted on the Washington Post website October 30, 2017:

Paul Ryan is wrong about which states have their acts together. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

As congressional Republicans prepare their tax-cut bill (and President Trump negotiates provisions on Twitter), the deduction for state and local taxes (SALT) has become a flash point. Last week, the Senate approved an amendment to abolish the deduction, which especially would benefit residents of states with stiffer state tax bills and higher property values.

Hailing elimination as tool to offset some of the huge rate cuts Republicans seek on corporate incomes and high earners, House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (Wis.) asserted that SALT unfairly subsidizes “big government states” and creates a situation in which “states that actually got their act together pay for states that didn’t.”

Defenders of the deduction, including Republicans from states such as New York and New Jersey, counter that even after the deduction, their states pay far more in federal taxes than they receive in federal spending. By that standard, wealthy populous blue states such as California subsidize less developed mostly red states. South Carolina, for example, despite its long history of opposition to the federal government, takes nearly $4 in federal spending for every dollar its citizens pay in federal taxes. Continue reading “Blue states already subsidize red states. Now red states want even more.”

How a Republican Idea for Reducing Medicare Costs Could Affect You

The following article by Austin Frakt was posted on the New York TImes website October 30, 2017:

Credit: Lennard Kok

Last month, as Republican leaders were preoccupied with another unsuccessful attempt to replace Obamacare, a senior Trump administration official issued a warning about a different major medical program, Medicare.

The official, Seema Verma, administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, wrote in The Wall Street Journal that Medicare was facing a fiscal crisis. She announced that she was asking the agency’s innovation center for ideas to address it, and that part of the answer was to give consumers “incentives to be cost-conscious.” This has some Democrats worried that she’s trying to move Medicare toward something called premium support, which would be a huge change for consumers.

Before we get into the pros and cons, what’s the fiscal crisis? According to projections from this year’s Medicare Trustees’ report, the fund that pays for Medicare-financed hospital care will be depleted in 12 years, and care for other services will consume an ever-larger share of the economy and federal revenue. Citing trends like those, Republicans included the outlines of a Medicare premium support plan in the House of Representatives’ fiscal year 2018 budget resolution, as they did in several prior ones. Continue reading “How a Republican Idea for Reducing Medicare Costs Could Affect You”

Republicans’ horrible week (and not-great year) was entirely predictable

The following article by Amber Phillips was posted on the Washington Post website October 28, 2017:

Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) said on Oct. 24 that he will not run for reelection in 2018. Flake said the GOP is at risk of becoming a “fearful, backward-looking minority party.” (U.S. Senate)

Nine months into gaining full control of Washington, Republicans are not where they hoped they’d be. Very far from it, actually. They have no major legislative accomplishments to tout. After this week, they are tipping into a civil war. And early polls suggest voters would rather elect a generic Democrat than a generic Republican in next year’s congressional elections.

All of this was entirely predictable  — not that there was much Republican leaders could do about it. And yes, I’m referring to President Trump. But Republicans’ fracturing was evident long before Trump rode down that escalator in Trump Tower two and a half years ago. Continue reading “Republicans’ horrible week (and not-great year) was entirely predictable”

GOP plans tax blitzkrieg

The following article by Scott Wong and Alexander Bolton was posted on the Hill website October 28, 2017:

© Getty images

Congressional Republicans are feeling enormous pressure to deliver a win on tax reform before Christmas Day.

After a humiliating defeat on ObamaCare repeal, GOP leaders are desperate for their first major legislative victory of 2017 and are doubling down on their ambitious timeline to overhaul the U.S. tax code.

Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) reiterated this week that House Republicans will pass their tax bill out of their chamber before the Thanksgiving recess kicks off on Nov. 16. Continue reading “GOP plans tax blitzkrieg”

Why Does Trump LOVE Tax Cuts? Because Americans Will Be Writing Him a YUGE Tax-Refund Check

The following article by David Cay Johnston of DC Report was posted on the AlterNet website October 24, 2017:

Here’s the Trump “middle class” tax-cut plan in a nutshell: two-thirds of the tax savings will go to the top 1%.

Trump and his surrogates say they intend to pass a middle-class tax cut this fall. Trump says he won’t be better off because of his tax plan. At times he says he will be worse off.

Nonsense. Pure nonsense.

Based on public statements by Trump, his surrogates and top Republican tax writers on Capitol Hill, what is coming is a tax-cut plan for billionaires. The Trump tax plan focuses on cutting the taxes of those who are self-employed or who own businesses while sticking it to wage and salary workers, even those earning quite generous salaries.

The annual tax savings alone for the 1% will be greater than the incomes earned by about 70% of Americans.

But what else should we expect from Trump and his cadre of rich pals? Trump ran for office promising to “drain the swamp” in Washington. He said that for too long the rich and powerful have been taking care of themselves. He promised to be the champion of the forgotten men and women of America. But like almost everything else, none of what he promised has translated into policy. Rather, we have seen the opposite.

The estimate that the 1% get two-thirds of the tax savings comes from an organization with a long history of reliability with its budget and tax numbers, the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP). It’s been around since 1980.

For more than two decades that I have studied its reports, subsequent events have shown the institute’s numbers to be rock solid. Indeed, tax policy wonks who work for the right-wing Heritage Foundation and the libertarian Cato Institute have said that while they disagree with how ITEP and its affiliate, Citizens for Tax Justice, interpret the numbers, the numbers themselves are always solid and reliable.

The figures in ITEP’s analysis of the Trump/GOP tax plan are disturbing in the way the plan shovels money at the already rich and tosses crumbs to everyone else. The estimates are based on public statements by Trump, his surrogates and Congressional Republicans.

To figure out how the tax cuts would be distributed, the institute divided the populace into fifths and then broke down the top fifth into 15%, then 4% and then the 1% at the apex of the economy. This is a standard technique in creating what are known as distribution tables.

The middle fifth—the very definition of the middle class—is expected to make $45,000 to $66,000 next year. People in this group will save on average $410 on income taxes, less than one cent out of every dollar earned.

The next fifth, those making $66,000 to $111,000, is in the same under-a-penny crowd. People here can expect to save about $530 each, while the next 15%, those standing on the 81st through 95th steps on the income ladder, will not do even that well. They stand to save just $180 each.

Even those on the 96th through 99th rungs, making $250,000 to $616,000, won’t quite break through the one-cent barrier, saving $3,510 on average.

If you’re at the top of the heap, among the favored 1% who make more than $616,000 a year, you are in for a bonanza. You and your friends—whose incomes average $2.1 million but can run up to the hundreds of millions of dollars—can expect to save an average of more than $90,000, about 4.2 cents for every dollar.

But even within the 1%, the higher into the income stratosphere you go, the greater your tax savings. Trump, who has made more than $100 million some years, will see his tax rate on most income fall from 39.6% to 25%. That’s a tax cut of 14.6 cents on each dollar, $14.6 million.

That’s $14.6 million a year that will not go to providing healthcare to millions of people, upgrade the nation’s nuclear arsenal, pay for soldiers’ funerals, rebuild Puerto Rico, better predict hurricanes, protect endangered species, build a border wall or even cover the Secret Service tab at Mar-a-Lago.

While Trump and his family enjoy big tax savings, the institute estimates that one family in five will pay higher taxes. Separately, Lily Batchelder, a New York University professor of tax law, has estimated that about one in six families will pay more.

Most of those paying more have families with three or more children. Trump plans to take away the exemption parents get for each dependent child. The way they plan to do it, the more children in a family the more they will be hurt, a curious policy for a president with five children by three women.

What You Can Do About It

While the Republican chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, Representative Kevin Brady, doesn’t care to hear the thoughts of Americans who live outside his Texas district, you can contact his staff. Their names and numbers are here.

The members of the Ways and Means Committee are listed here.

On the Senate side, the Finance Committee is chaired by Republican Orrin Hatch of Utah. A list of members is here.

The Senate Finance Committee staff are at 202-224-4515 or by fax at 202-228-0554.

View the post here.

Why we need to save the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau

The following article by Professors Jeff Sovern, Ann L. Goldweber and Gina M. Calabrese was posted on the Conversation website October 25, 2017:

Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Director Richard Cordray testifies on Capitol Hill in 2013. AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta

Republicans in Congress and the White House have been very blunt about their desire to gut the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau – and the threats to it are mounting.

The agency was launched in 2011 in the aftermath of the financial crisis as part of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. The goal was to protect consumers from deceptive or misleading practices in the financial industry.

At the moment, Republicans seem focused on blocking CFPB rules they don’t like, such as one that would have prevented the use of arbitration clauses in financial contracts, making it easier for people to band together to sue banks for wrongdoing. Separately, the Trump administration has been heavily critical of the CFPB, and its director is said to be considering leaving before his term expires next July, which would allow the president to pick his replacement. Continue reading “Why we need to save the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau”

Avoiding Another ‘Brownbackistan’

The following column was posted on the Roll Call website October 24, 2017:

Tax cuts in Kansas led to an economic train wreck

Kansas Governor Sam Brownback’s tax cuts are a cautionary tale for Washington lawmakers who are hitting the gas to get a tax reform package completed by the end of the year without paying much attention to details, Patricia Murphy writes. (Andrew Burton/Getty Images)

“Economic gold rush? Or fiscal wreck?” That was the question the Kansas City Star asked on May 23, 2012, the day after Gov. Sam Brownback signed a sweeping series of state tax cuts into law. Five years later, the Kansas tax cuts are looking a lot more train wreck than gold rush, with a $900 million deficit and Brownback’s fellow Republicans stepping in to reverse the cuts he pushed.

Kansas also offers an awfully timely cautionary tale for Washington lawmakers, who are hitting the gas on getting a tax reform package — any tax reform package — done by the end of the year in order to chalk at least one win on the board for 2017, but who don’t seem to be sweating the details just yet.

Continue reading “Avoiding Another ‘Brownbackistan’”

Sen. Jeff Flake of Arizona will retire, citing direction of GOP under Trump

The following article by Ed O’Keefe and David Weigel was posted on the Washington Post website October 24, 2017:

Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) announced on Oct. 24 that he won’t seek reelection in 2018, joining at least five other Republican members of Congress who say they won’t seek another term. (Sarah Parnass, Jenny Starrs/The Washington Post)

Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) on Tuesday announced plans to retire from the U.S. Senate at the end of his term, saying he was out of step with the Republican Party in the era of President Trump.

The senator’s surprise announcement came after more than a year of criticism of Trump and the direction he has taken the party, culminating in a book called “Conscience of a Conservative” that critiqued the president’s character and ideology. Recent polls in Arizona found Flake trailing the Democrat’s likely Senate nominee, Rep. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.), as well as potential primary challengers if he sought a second term next year. Continue reading “Sen. Jeff Flake of Arizona will retire, citing direction of GOP under Trump”

Hopes Dim for Congressional Russia Inquiries as Parties Clash

The following article by Nicholas Fandos was posted on the New York Times website October 22, 2017:

Representative Adam B. Schiff, left, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, and Representative K. Michael Conaway, Republican of Texas, have maintained a productive relationship in helping lead the panel, but the committee has been on rocky ground for months. Credit J. Scott Applewhite/Associated Press

WASHINGTON — In a secured room in the basement of the Capitol in July, Jared Kushner, President Trump’s son-in-law and senior adviser, fielded question after question from members of the House Intelligence Committee. Though the allotted time for the grilling had expired, he offered to stick around as long as they wanted.

But Representative Trey Gowdy, who spent nearly three years investigating Hillary Clinton’s culpability in the deadly 2012 attack in Benghazi, Libya, was growing frustrated after two hours. You are in an unwinnable situation, Mr. Gowdy, a South Carolina Republican, counseled Mr. Kushner. If you leave now, Democrats will say you did not answer all the questions. If you stay, they will keep you here all week.

The exchange, described by three people with knowledge of it, typified the political morass that is crippling the House Intelligence Committee’s investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election — and whether the Trump campaign colluded in any way. Continue reading “Hopes Dim for Congressional Russia Inquiries as Parties Clash”