The Republican tax plan for the “middle class” is going over as well as their many plans to repeal Obamacare. Media quickly picked up on the fact that Republican rhetoric that their tax plan is good for middle class working families is belied by the actual policy.
Rich Lowry, editor of the conservative National Review, called it out:
Question: How can you spend months touting a middle-class tax cut and then introduce a plan that doesn't reliably cut middle-class taxes?
— Rich Lowry (@RichLowry) September 28, 2017
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NBC News announced the tax plan rhetoric doesn’t match reality, just like it didn’t on their health care plan, “GOP Rhetoric on New Tax Plan Doesn’t Match Reality…. Much like they did in the health care debate — More people will be insured! Pre-existing protections won’t be touched! Your premiums will go down! — Republicans are making promises about their tax plan that they won’t be able to keep, according to the details released Wednesday.”
USA Today noted that as of right now, a lot would have to change before it would be accurate that Trump’s promises that the tax plan wouldn’t be good for him but would be good for working families.
“President Trump is making one thing clear about his plan to cut taxes: It won’t be a windfall for the richest Americans, including him. ‘It’s not good for me, believe me,’ Trump said in a speech unveiling the tax reform blueprint on Wednesday. … ‘We’re targeting relief to working families,’ Trump said in Indianapolis. ‘We will make sure benefits are focused on the middle class, the working men and women, not the highest-income earners.’ A lot would have to change before that’s true.”
Jennifer Rubin at The Washington Post saw it the same way, “Trump and his advisers at various times have promised not to give the rich any tax cut, to attack the deficit/debt and to bolster the middle class. His tax plan bears no resemblance to that message, as Democrats were eager to point out on Wednesday.â€
And they were hardly alone. A big gift to the rich, who have been suffering so:
“But another provision, which would slash the rate paid by owners of partnerships and limited-liability companies, is seen as a potential bonanza for people at the top of the income scale, ” Bloomberg wrote.
“The administration and its congressional allies are proposing to sharply reduce taxation of business income, primarily benefiting the small share of the population that owns the vast majority of corporate equity,” The New York Times weighed in.
It looks like it could really hurt middle class working families, not just fail to lower their taxes.
Josh Barro at The Wall Street Journal explained.
The LA Times warned not to buy the spin, “Don’t buy the spin. Judging from the scanty details in the framework, low- and middle-income Americans may or may not see a tax cut, and if they do, it will be modest. Wealthy Americans, however, will be granted immense benefits. Their most cherished tax breaks will be protected, other tax breaks will be added and they’ll even see a reduction in their top marginal tax rate.â€
Draining the swamp, or giving them a big old Christmas prezzie?
“High-income Wall Street financiers could be unintended winners from a section of U.S. President Donald Trump’s tax-cut plan that is meant to help mostly small, “mom-and-pop†businesses,” Reuters reported.
Republicans are perhaps so used to getting away with misrepresenting their policies during the Obama years that they don’t realize that now that they are in charge, the media will actually open that paper, read that text, and report on the rhetoric because it can actually impact people’s lives.
For years, Republicans promised they had a repeal and replace plan for Obamacare, but when they finally got all of the power and ran out of excuses, they could not come to agreement on a bill because their bills would harm millions of people.
Now Republicans are doing the same thing with their tax bill, and in the doing just hours after their latest Obamacare disaster, they are cementing in the media’s mind the idea that their rhetoric does not match the policy at all.
Like, at all.
Republicans say it’s for the middle class and won’t help rich men like Trump? This means it will not help the middle class, or helping the middle class isn’t a priority, or it might even hurt them. But one thing is for sure; it will help rich men like President Trump. That is, the opposite of how Republicans are presenting it.
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