Democrats’ Historic Tax Hikes Would Hurt Families and Help China

U.S. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) delivered the following remarks today on the Senate floor regarding Democrats’ tax hikes:

“A senior House Democrat told us in March 2020 that COVID presented, ‘a tremendous opportunity to restructure things to fit our vision.’

“President Biden said last week that while ‘this pandemic has been godawful for so many reasons… it does present us with an opportunity.’

“The reckless taxing and spending spree that Washington Democrats are assembling behind closed doors would put more debt, more borrowing, and more inflation on the shoulders of American families. It would make Washington D.C. dramatically more involved in families’ childcare arrangements, their health coverage, their local energy utilities, and on and on.

“There are so many controversial changes being crammed into one mega-bill that it must be a deliberate strategy: Try to achieve everything the far left has wanted for 20 years in one fell swoop before the country has time to realize what hit it.

“Today I’ll focus on just one example: Tax hikes.

“A staggering, historic set of tax hikes.

“Tax hikes on small businesses. Tax hikes on family farms.

“Tax hikes on Americans that would shatter the pledge to spare people earning less than $400,000.

“Tax hikes that would pull even more Americans into the unfair double taxation of the death tax.

“Massive tax hikes on the U.S. economy that would give us one of the least competitive tax structures in the developed world. Even Communist China taxes their own businesses significantly less than President Biden and his allies want America to tax ours.

“Tax hike after tax hike after tax hike. A smothering wet blanket thrown onto an economy that is already struggling to fully recover because of the inflation and worker shortages that Democrats’ policies have already unleashed.

“When you add it all up, Democrats want to ram through one of the largest peacetime tax hikes on record, if not the single largest. Let me say that again. Behind closed doors, Washington Democrats are drafting what may very well be the largest peacetime tax hike that our country has ever recorded.

“But this isn’t to say that nobody gets a leg up. Somehow, mysteriously, many of Democrats’ favorite groups and special interests come out just fine. Isn’t that fascinating.

“For example, their legislation would allow ordinary Americans’ charitable deduction on top of the standard deduction to expire… but they’d replace it with a brand-new tax break of almost exactly the same dollar amount for the union dues that go to big labor.

“They are scrapping Americans’ extra deduction for donating to charity and replacing it with a special subsidy for union dues to Big Labor.

“You can’t make this up.

“Sorry, Red Cross… sorry, local churches and houses of worship… sorry, soup kitchens. Democrats think the Teamsters and the SEIU need money more than you do!

“And they aren’t the only group that Democrats favor who make out like bandits. Look at high income earners in coastal blue states.

“This bill that raises taxes on everything that moves somehow makes room for a special, gigantic tax cut for wealthy people who choose to live in high-tax states. More than half the benefit of the so-called SALT policy would go to the top 1 percent of households.

“There’s also a special tax break for people who choose to purchase expensive electric cars.

“Do you get the picture? Make U.S. industry less competitive than China in order to massively subsidize the coastal cosmopolitan lifestyle. That’s what Democrats want.

“This bill would also create a new national dragnet for ordinary Americans’ banking information.

“Community banks and credit unions would be hammered with new requirements to report to the feds whenever citizens make transactions in excess of $600.

“Big Brother wants to peer more into Americans’ bank accounts. Here’s how one local Kentucky lender described this concept to me: quote — a ‘flagrant violation of privacy and offense to liberty.’

“So -- huge tax hikes on Americans, expensive giveaways for coastal elites, and new government snooping into families’ finances.

“So Mr. President, that’s just one corner of this reckless taxing and spending spree that should never see the light of day.”