ICMYI: WSJ: "Republicans Effectively Voted to Raise Taxes. They're Fine With That."

Months after promising not to raise taxes, House Republicans voted this week for a tax increase on the middle class and on American manufacturers. As the Wall Street Journal put it this morning, "The party, united for decades around the view that net tax increases are unacceptable, on Wednesday advanced debt-ceiling legislation that would raise taxes by more than $300 billion over a decade … effectively raising taxes on some manufacturers, car buyers and others."

Every House Republican who voted for Speaker McCarthy's default bill voted to undermine American manufacturing and send American jobs overseas, to raise taxes on hardworking families, and to increase energy costs. This is exactly what President Biden means when he says this is not your father's Republican Party. House Republicans want to reverse the manufacturing surge under President Biden—with private sector investments totaling more than $400 billion and almost 800,000 manufacturing jobs created, including more than 100 clean energy projects creating 77,000 jobs in Republican-held districts since the Inflation Reduction Act was passed.

This, even as House Republicans continue to push for massive tax giveaways for the super-wealthy and special interests. Instead of raising taxes on middle-class and working families and slashing programs they rely on, Republicans should join the President in making the rich and special interests pay their fair share while not raising taxes on anyone making less than $400,000 a year.

Read the full article below:

Wall Street Journal: Republicans Effectively Voted to Raise Taxes. They're Fine With That.
House GOP backed repealing clean-energy tax credits without offsetting tax cuts
[Richard Rubin, 4/29/23]

Republicans finally found a tax increase they can support.

The party, united for decades around the view that net tax increases are unacceptable, on Wednesday advanced debt-ceiling legislation that would raise taxes by more than $300 billion over a decade, according to official congressional estimates.

The bill, which passed in the GOP-controlled House and won't survive the Democratic-led Senate, would repeal clean-energy tax credits that Congress created last year. The changes would shrink breaks for wind energy, solar power, hydrogen and electric vehicles, effectively raising taxes on some manufacturers, car buyers and others.

Top Republicans see such clean-energy subsidies as more like spending rather than tax reductions, and they say their debt-ceiling bill would end such inefficient, expensive programs created by Democrats. They also promised that any final bill wouldn't include net tax increases. Republicans continue to oppose tax hikes President Biden has proposed for high-income households and corporations, and they are proposing further tax cuts for businesses and individuals.

Still, their willingness to advance a bill that the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office says would raise tax revenue shows Republicans are less focused on official tax tallies and more determined to reverse Mr. Biden's agenda.

[…]

The CBO found that the House GOP bill would cut projected government deficits by $4.8 trillion over 10 years, before a few minor last-minute revisions. The bill contains tax increases that total at least $515 billion over a decade, according to the nonpartisan Joint Committee on Taxation. That estimate is likely low because it doesn't yet include the effect of eliminating electric-vehicle credits, which would likely raise billions of dollars more.

The House bill included one revenue-reducing provision—rescinding new enforcement funding for the Internal Revenue Service. That would lower tax revenue by $191 billion, so when laid against the energy-tax changes, the bill still raises taxes overall.

In the past, that imbalance might have given Republicans heartburn. The GOP-backed 2017 tax law, for example, repealed or limited many tax breaks, but those were far outweighed by tax cuts. Republicans sparred among themselves in 2011 over whether to curb ethanol tax breaks without cutting taxes elsewhere.

Most Republicans have signed a no-tax-hike pledge written by Grover Norquist's Americans for Tax Reform. As top party leaders rallied votes for the debt-ceiling bill, they promised lawmakers that the final version won't raise taxes.

[…]

Some Republicans who were wavering on the debt-ceiling bill, such as Rep. Nancy Mace (R., S.C.), argued that it would raise taxes. But the bulk of House Republicans focused on their objections to Democrats' renewable-energy policies.

The clean-energy tax breaks and IRS expansion that Republicans want to eliminate were established in the climate, health and tax law known as the Inflation Reduction Act. Congress passed the law last year with no Republican votes. Democrats view it as a pillar of their efforts to fight climate change and tax cheating, and say the GOP plan would imperil both efforts.

[…]