ART STEAL OF THE
Congress OKs tax heist rewarding mega-rich, socking middle class and blue states
FORGET ROBIN HOOD, Republicans want to steal from the poor and give to the rich.
The controversial tax overhaul bill was approved early Wednesday by a 51-to-48 vote in the Senate.
The $1.5 trillion package will return to Congress for another vote because certain provisions in the bill violated Senate rules.
The House on Tuesday approved a historic GOP-led effort to overhaul the nation’s tax code, delivering major windfalls to the wealthy and leaving the less fortunate worse off than they already are.
The bill is expected to be signed by President Trump on Wednesday.
While the cuts to corporate taxes are permanent, tax benefits for the middle class disappear after a few years.
The tax bill levies an across-the-board increase in taxes for Americans earning less than $75,000 by 2027, according to an analysis by the Joint Committee on Taxation.
The Tax Policy Center found that 53% of taxpayers will see a tax hike by the same year.
“Yet again, Republicans showed their only priority is to give the richest few a bigger piece of the pie,” Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) tweeted moments after the vote. The legislation passed the House by a 227-to-203 margin Tuesday, with only 12 Republicans voting against the measure. But Democrats said a procedural snag — three provisions in the bill violate Senate rules and must be removed — will force the House to vote again on Wednesday. Still, House Republicans took a victory lap ahead of the decision, with Speaker Paul Ryan applauding his fellow GOPers. “My colleagues, this is a day I’ve been looking forward to for a long time. We are about to achieve some really big things,” he said from the floor of the House. “Things that the cynics have scoffed at for years, decades even. Ideas that have been worked on for so long to help hardworking Americans who have been left behind for too long.” “Kill the bill! Don’t kill us!” demonstrators shouted during both votes. One protester was ejected by Capitol Police on Tuesday and Ryan finished his self-congratulatory speech. “Lies, lies!” she shouted as Ryan touted the tax bill. “You lie! Only the rich will benefit!” The 12 Republicans in the House who stood against the bill, the majority from high-tax states such as New York, New Jersey and California, objected to the scaling back of state and local tax writeoffs.
The Senate vote went straight down party lines, with every Republican voting in favor of the bill, and every Democrat voting against it.
Sen. John McCain, who has brain cancer, was spending time with family in Arizona and won’t be available to vote.
Vice President Pence rescheduled a trip to Egypt and Israel as a precaution, should his tiebreaking vote be needed.
A CNN poll released Tuesday found that opposition to the bill has grown 10 percentage points since early November, and 55% of Americans have a negative view of the legislation. Just 33% say they favor the GOP-led effort. Ryan remained positive, insisting that “results are going to make this popular.”
“This is the most important piece of legislation that Congress has passed in decades to help the American worker, to help grow the American economy,” he said. “This is a profound change, and this is change that is going to put our country on the right path.”
Trump has repeatedly told Congress he wants the 570-page bill on his desk before Christmas, hoping for a much-needed legislative win before the end of the year. Earlier efforts to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act ended with a humiliating defeat.
Trump, without citing any evidence, has also claimed in recent weeks that the bill will “cost him a fortune.”
But the majority of the bill’s provisions would be a boon to billionaires — and it is impossible for the public to know how the overhaul will affect Trump since he refuses to release his tax returns.
“I said in some ways, particularly on the personal side, the President will likely take a big hit,” White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said. “But on the business side, he could benefit, but the biggest focus for this White House has been to make sure all Americans are better off today after this tax package passes than they were beforehand.”
The core of the compromise plan, hammered out in a matter of days after the House and Senate passed slightly different versions of the legislation, calls for a permanent reduction of the corporate tax rate from 35% to 21% and the restructuring of tax rates for individuals.
The biggest cuts benefit the wealthiest Americans and most of the individual breaks expire within a decade.
Despite GOP platitudes about scaling back debt, the bill is projected to add $1.46 trillion to the nation’s debt over a decade. GOP lawmakers said they expect tax cuts for lowand-middle-income Americans to be extended before they expire in 2025, but made no promises.
The Tax Policy Center estimates that about 80% of the benefits of the plan go to the top 1% of earners.
The bill also rescinds the Obamacare individual mandate requiring Americans buy health insurance or face a tax penalty. An amendment added to the bill will open Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil and natural gas drilling.
Ryan and his fellow Republicans argue that corporations will create more jobs and boost the economy thanks to the bill.
But groups across the board pushed back against the bill.
The AARP fears that increases to the deficit will trigger cuts to Medicare if Congress doesn’t waive sequestration rules for federal spending.
Gov. Cuomo blasted New York Congress members who voted for the bill, tweeting that they were taking “money from their constituents and send(ing) it to corporations and other states.
“Republicans in the House have committed fraud against the American people,” he added.