“Not One Penny” Campaign Targets Young And Blum On Trump Tax Cuts

By Rick Smith

September 7, 2017

A number of progressive groups have partnered with the new “Not One Penny” campaign. The focus will be to block Trump and the Republicans’ promised tax cuts. Following the success in stopping the repeal of Obamacare, these liberal organizations are moving to stop the second Trump initiative to cut taxes. The group’s pledge and theme is, “Not one Penny in tax cuts for millionaires, billionaires and wealthy corporations.”

The groups that are uniting under the “Not One Penny” banner include TaxMarch, Indivisible, MoveOn, Working Families and Stand Up America. The campaign kicked off in early August and conducted rallies around the nation in mid-August. Action Iowa and Indivisible Iowa held “Not One Penny” rallies in Iowa in August.

Nationally, “Not One Penny” targeted eight Republicans with TV ads in August asking “Why are Republicans pushing a tax bill that would give billions more to the richest?”

Politico reported the targeted lawmakers include Iowa Representatives Rod Blum and David Young, Martha McSally (Arizona), Kevin Yoder (Kansas), Bruce Poliquin (Maine), Will Hurd (Texas), Rick Crawford (Arkansas) and Darrell Issa (California). They all (except Crawford) are in districts that are considered competitive. “Not One Penny” projected that they spent a seven figure amount on the ad buys. Hopefully, “Not One Penny” will continue to hammer Blum and Young.

They are also targeting one Democrat for his support of corporate tax cuts. Tim Ryan (Ohio) announced last week he would join Republicans to support corporate tax cuts. He added that he wouldn’t support tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans.

“To be competitive globally, we have to reduce the corporate tax rate,” Ryan told The Hill. “We’re just not competitive globally because of that.”

Nicole Gill, Executive Director of TaxMarch, explains why “Not One Penny” opposes tax cuts for the wealthy.

“Progressives have known for a while that tax cuts were the number two priority for Trump, after Obamacare repeal. They have the money, and we have the millions — we have actual people who want to fight this…The American people are sick and tired of the wealthy and well-connected not paying their fair share,” said Gill. “[We] will hold lawmakers accountable for trying to give even more tax breaks to billionaires and corporate insiders, while working American families foot the bill.”

The Center for Budget and Policy Priorities describe who would benefit from the Trump proposed tax cuts.

“The Trump tax plan presented so far would have a net cost of $3.5 trillion over ten years. Half of the tax cuts would go to the top 1 percent of households and a fifth to the top 0.1 percent. That top 0.1 percent (whose annual incomes exceed $3.4 million) would get tax cuts totaling more than $900,000 a year on average, boosting their after-tax incomes by more than 13 percent. Low- and moderate-income families would see tax cuts that are much smaller in both dollar terms and as a share of their after-tax incomes.”

Tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans and profitable corporations is certain to be an important campaign issue going forward. Progressive groups are uniting by advocating for more fairness in the distribution of income. Republicans’ support for more tax cuts for the richest 1% will leave them vulnerable to accusations that they have abandoned the needs of the middle class.

 

by Rick Smith
Posted 9/7/17

CATEGORIES: Uncategorized

Politics

Local News

Related Stories
Share This