Oh, so now the Republicans care about it
While the much-needed $1.9 trillion relief that just passed the Senate has overwhelmingly bipartisan support with about 70% of the country on board, not a single Senate Republican voted for it, leaving Vice President Harris to cast the tie breaking vote. What Senate Republicans did do, however, was vote unanimously in favor of the least popular tax cut in history – the 2017 Trump tax cuts – in an effort to make them permanent. The law, which largely punishes the states that didn’t support Donald Trump in 2016, actually raised taxes for over 10 million families in America, while adding another $1 trillion to the debt that Republicans are once again pretending to care about.
It should be noted that while this law that was basically drawn up as a gift basket to the GOP’s top donors had the support of 50 senators, it didn’t have the backing of a single Democrat – the only reason it died in the Senate. This is one of the most solid examples we have to date of why both parties aren’t the same, since these same Republicans have no intent of providing relief to the people who need it most.
Should the Republicans have succeeded in making the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 permanent, setting provisions for individual tax rates would have made it even more costly, further delaying any efforts at recovery. Despite their attempts to suddenly be concerned about the size of the debt, which is really just a way to keep Democrats from getting anything accomplished while they hold all of the power, the national debt ballooned up another $7.8 trillion under the Trump administration.
James Sullivan is the assistant editor of Brain World Magazine and an advocate of science-based policy making