Rich People Are the Only Republican Priority

Just three days after Republicans took three days and 15 rounds of votes to elect Kevin McCarthy as Speaker of the House they spent less than three hours to pass H.R. 23 which would defund the Internal Revenue Service by $7 billion a year. The vote was 221-210, with all Republicans voting for the bill and all Democrats voting against, three members were absent and one is deceased. 8 members of the Texas delegation co-sponsored the bill.

The significance of this is that the Congressional Budget Office, a non-partisan agency that provides factual budgetary information so that Congress can make informed decisions, reported that the effect of the bill will be the loss of $18.6 billion in tax revenues so the net loss to the government is $11.6 billion. That’s money millionaire tax cheats will get away with not paying because the bill specifically takes the funds from the budget for auditing high income earners. For well over a decade you and I have been more likely to be audited by the IRS than people taking in a $400,000 or more. Late last year Congress passed legislation to significantly increase funding for staff who would be assigned to audit high income earners.

That’s right, upon taking control of the House Republicans first order of business was to protect wealthy tax cheats. Don’t let the bill’s name fool you, while the Nebraska congressman who filed the bill, Adrian Smith, named it the “Family and Small Business Taxpayer Protection Act” nothing in the bill affects audits of small family businesses.

But that’s not the only pro-rich people action in H.R. 23, it also rescinds recently passed legislation that would require the Internal Revenue Service to allow individual and small business tax payers to file their taxes electronically directly instead of forcing us to use TurboTax or some other third party that gets to charge us $35 or more. Yeah, protecting wealthy tax cheats and big corporations’ opportunity to profit on people paying their taxes is the most immediately important legislation Republican members of Congress could think of.

The new Republican majority isn’t done with the taxes yet though; as part of the deal that was agreed to in order for Kevin McCarthy to get the votes he needed win the Speakership he committed to call a vote on H.R. 25 by Georgia Congressman Earl “Buddy” Carter. In another episode of mis-naming bills this one is called the “Fair Tax Act of 2023” and would abolish the Internal Revenue Service, eliminate the tax code, replace income taxes, payroll taxes, and estate and gift taxes with a straight 23% national sales tax. Since most of us spend just about everything we earn that means we’d pay more national sales tax than we currently pay in national income taxes because we get deductions for ourselves, our dependents, mortgage interest, and possibly other things. Now I’ll admit that H.R. 25 has a “monthly tax rebate” that’s supposed to go back to taxpayers “based upon criteria related to family size and poverty guidelines,” but since it abolishes the IRS and doesn’t include any provision for an agency to figure out how money each person should get back or be responsible for sending them checks it just leaves working stiffs like you and me carrying all the weight of funding the federal government while the rich get off cheap.

My dad was right 50 years ago when he told me that the Republican Party is the party of the rich. They’re doing everything they can to prove him right.

 Published in the Seguin Gazette - January 18, 2023