The GOP Tax Plan is a Scam that Will Rip Off Latinos
By Tom Perez
Like many Latinos and children of immigrants, I worked hard to put myself through college. I paid my way with jobs in a warehouse and as a garbage collector on the back of a trash truck. So I know garbage when I see it. And the Republican tax plan is a dumpster fire.
This bill was written for Donald Trump’s wealthy friends on Wall Street, not for American families, and certainly not the millions of immigrant families who came here ready to work for the American dream.
We’ve seen this movie before: Republicans vote for massive giveaways to the richest corporations and individuals at the expense of the middle class, hurting millions of Latinos in the process. But this sequel is even worse. The new bill House Republicans voted on today doesn’t just give millionaires and billionaires a break. It also means deep cuts to health care, education, and mortgage deductions that Latino families rely on, while blowing a $2 trillion hole in the deficit.
Republicans have been excitedly pitching this plan as a great boon for middle-class families. But the facts tell a different story. The median Hispanic family earns $47,675 a year, and roughly a quarter of families in their tax bracket would see their taxes go up under the Republican plan. Millions of Latino children would not be eligible for the new Child Tax Credit, threatening their families’ economic security even further. Meanwhile, nearly half the plan’s benefits go to the top 1%. In a rare moment of honesty from the White House, tax plan author Gary Cohn even admitted that the people most excited about the Republican tax plan were “big CEOs.”
To pay for their corporate tax cuts, Republicans want to cut health care, education, job training, and other programs vital to middle-class Hispanic families. That includes $1 trillion in cuts to Medicaid, which is going to devastate the program’s recipients nationwide, one in three of whom are Hispanic. Additionally, the more than four million Hispanic-owned small businesses in the U.S. will find it even harder to compete against big businesses, as over 90% of small businesses would receive no benefit from the proposed business tax reductions. This would only slow down the dramatic trend of growth of Hispanic-owned businesses and entrepreneurs in the U.S. over the past decade.
This tax plan is a scam to rip off working families — plain and simple. And by pushing this disgraceful legislation, Donald Trump, Mike Pence, and Republicans in Congress are sending a loud and clear message to the American people: the GOP works for wealthy donors and the special interests who fund their campaigns. And they have no qualms about limiting opportunities for Latinos and immigrant families to implement their agenda.
Democrats believe that we should reform our tax system to work better for the middle class, not Wall Street bankers. And we will fight tooth-and-nail to make sure this bill never makes it to Donald Trump’s desk.
