Conservative group Americans for Tax Reform (ATR) announced Monday they will launch an ad campaign in House battle ground districts to oppose President Joe Biden’s “tax-and-spend blowout” $3.5 trillion reconciliation package.
ATR told Politico Playbook the group’s public relations campaign will feature a seven figure ad buy of 30 second television ads and digital impressions that oppose the package’s far-left initiatives, such as expanding Medicare, amnesty, global warming initiatives, suburb displacement with low-income housing, subsidized housing, subsidized child care, and subsidized racial equity and environmental justice initiatives.
The ads will air in the following House districts: Angie Craig (D-MN), Cindy Axne (D-IA), Susie Lee (D-NV), Elaine Luria (D-VA), Jared Golden (D-ME), Lizzie Fletcher (D-TX), Susan Wild (D-PA), Tom Malinowski (D-NJ), and Matt Cartwright (D-PA).
Rep. Elaine Luria (D-VA) participates in the House Select Committee hearing investigating the January 6 attack on US Capitol (Bill O’Leary-Pool/Getty Images).
One ad of the blitz will read, “CONGRESSMAN CARTWRIGHT, say NO to Biden’s Socialist Tax Plan.”
Many of the House districts in which ATR is focusing have revealed in September poor approval ratings for Biden. The ad campaign is thereby intended to pressure House members to oppose an unpopular president and his radical agenda that will come before the House in the coming month, where House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) only has a margin of three members to potentially pass the package.
Pelosi’s narrow majority is under pressure to find harmony with the Senate’s package proposal, which currently does not retain moderate Democrat’s SALT deduction, a Trump-era deduction far-left Democrats are eager to terminate.
Instead, House Ways and Means Chairman Richard Neal (D-MA) has proposed severe tax hikes in the package:
- Corporate tax rate hike to 26.5 percent from 21 percent
- Capital gains tax rate hike to 28.8 percent from 23.8 percent
- New three percent on people making more than $5 million
- A minimum tax on all U.S. companies’ foreign income to 16.5 percent from 10.5 percent
- Additional funding for IRS taxpayer enforcement
Neal told the Wall Street Journal the “proposals expand opportunity for the American people and support our efforts to build a healthier, more prosperous future.” Neal did not addressed the unintended consequences that large spending would have on an economy struggling under Bidenflation and a labor shortage filled by excessive unemployment benefits.
The Democrat infighting over what should or should not be included within the package has divided the party. Far-left Democrats have pushed back against Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV), for instance, because he will not support fully support the $3.5 trillion dollar package as it is. Manchin’s statements have caused Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and her far-left allies to push back on Manchin by suggesting he is not the only Democrat to hold sway.
“It’s not just Sen. Manchin who has leverage,” she explained. “Frankly, the entire party also needs to quote-unquote worry. Because just as we have a slim Senate margin, we have a slim House margin. So we aren’t saying it’s either your bill or our bill but that both of these bills must move forward together or neither will.”
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