Washington, DC – Tonight’s Republican debate on the economy focused will focus exclusively on giveaways to the super rich, workplace polices that hurt workers and their families, and wages that are too low for families to prosper. How do we know already? Because the Republicans running for president have spent decades fighting for their mega-donors instead of the American people.
“If elected, every Republican on that stage tonight will slash taxes for the super-rich, gut programs that level the playing field for middle class, and they won’t lift a finger for the working families that are still fighting for a shot at prosperity,” said Adrienne Watson. “We don’t need to wait to hear it for the thousandth time, just look at their records. Hillary Clinton is the leading candidate fighting for paid family leave, giving America a raise through the minimum wage, and a growth and fairness economy that starts with the middle class, and these Republicans will stop at nothing to prevent that.”
Republican mega-donors like the Koch Brothers are imposing a strict economic agenda on the GOP, and none of the candidates dare to step out of line. At tonight’s debate, you can expect more of the same on these and other issues:
KOCH DEMAND #1:
END MEDICARE AND SOCIAL SECURITY AS WE KNOW THEM
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Marco Rubio:
“[Rubio] said he supports gradually raising the Social Security retirement age, which now sits at 67, for future beneficiaries, and embraced Rep. Paul Ryan’s push to transition Medicare into a ‘premium-support’ plan, where seniors would be given a voucher to buy insurance on the private market.” [Washington Times, 5/13/14]
“U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio has drawn flak this week from Democrats and retirement experts for his comments that [programs like Medicare and Social Security] have ‘weakened us as a people.’” [Sarasota Herald-Tribune, 8/25/11] |
Ben Carson:
“Republicans have fended off accusations for years that they’d gut Medicare for seniors and end the program ‘as we know it.’ Not Ben Carson. The former neurosurgeon acknowledges he would abolish the program altogether. Below Carson, who now leads the GOP field in Iowa according to the latest Quinnipiac Poll, would eliminate the program that provides health care to 49 million senior citizens, as well as Medicaid, and replace it with a system of cradle-to-grave savings accounts which would be funded with $2,000 a year in government contributions.” [Politico, 10/22/15] |
Jeb Bush:
“Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush said Wednesday that we ought to phase out Medicare, the federal program that provides health insurance to Americans once they’re 65. ‘We need to make sure we fulfill the commitment to people that have already received the benefits, that are receiving the benefits,’ Bush said. ‘But we need to figure out a way to phase out this program for others and move to a new system that allows them to have something, because they’re not going to have anything.’” [Huffington Post, 7/23/15] |
AND THE REST? THEY’RE ALL THE SAME.
Donald Trump: On phasing out Medicare with private savings accounts: “I’m OK with the savings accounts. I think it’s a good idea.”
Ted Cruz: Cruz supported increasing the Medicare retirement age and transitioning it to a “premium support” voucher system.
Rand Paul: Paul introduced legislation that would end traditional Medicare and supported raising the Medicare retirement age to 70.
Chris Christie: Christie called for an increase in the Medicare retirement age and for means testing Social Security.
Bobby Jindal: Jindal presented a health care plan that proposed turning Medicare into a voucher system.
KOCH DEMAND #2:
A TAX PLAN THAT SOAKS THE MIDDLE CLASS AND HELPS THE RICH
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Marco Rubio:
“If he wins his party’s nomination, though, Rubio will have to defend a tax plan that, while said to address the challenges of the middle class, includes a huge break that all-but bypasses the middle and greatly boosts the rich. It was a tax plan that was even too large for Romney himself to run on. The latest version of Rubio’s tax plan, which he released with fellow Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) in March, shrinks the income tax down to two rates, lowering the top rate in the process, and includes new tax breaks for working families. It also eliminates all taxes on dividends and capital gains. That’s where rich taxpayers cash in. They are overwhelmingly the ones in the economy who draw income from capital, such as holdings and sales of stocks.” [Washington Post, 4/14/15]
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Ben Carson:
“[Fox News Sunday host] Chris Wallace confronted Carson with tax experts, who found that to raise the same amount of revenue the federal government currently takes in [under Carson’s flat tax plan], the government would have to impose a 20 percent tax across the board. (The Tax Policy Center argues it would have to be at least 25 percent.) ‘Middle incomes would get a tax hike and wealthy families would get a tax cut,’ Wallace explained. Carson countered that he simply didn’t ‘agree with that assessment.’ […] Wallace followed up by asking about low-income families, […] ‘Now you’ll have them pay 10 to 15 percent of income they have — or 20 percent if my experts are right. A lot of independent studies say the people that make like bandits in this are the wealthy.’” [Think Progress, 5/10/15]
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Donald Trump:
“[The Tax Foundation] says the proposal from the real estate magnate Donald J. Trump, who leads Republican polls, would raise incomes of the top 1 percent of earners 27 percent — also the most of any group.” [New York Times, 10/14/15] |
AND THE REST? THEY’RE ALL THE SAME.
Ted Cruz: Cruz has called for a national flat tax, a proposal that has been called a “colossal giveaway to the rich.”
Jeb Bush: Bush’s federal tax plan offered up a massive tax cut for the richest Americans.
Carly Fiorina: Fiorina has, according to observers, espoused “more or less the official line of the Republican Party on taxation.”
Mike Huckabee: According to the New York Times, Huckabee favored “a tax plan that analysts say…disproportionately benefits the affluent.”
Rand Paul: Paul’s tax plan would most benefit incomes above $1 million.
Chris Christie: Christie pushed to cut the income tax rate for the wealthiest Americans by 11 percent and lower the corporate tax rate by 10 percent.
John Kasich: Kasich supported a plan that would cut taxes for the top 1 percent in Ohio while increasing the tax burden on the bottom 60 percent of earners.
Lindsey Graham: Graham said it was “stupid” to allow tax cuts for the wealthy to expire.
Bobby Jindal: According to Vox, Jindal’s tax plan would “eliminate the standard deduction and personal/dependent exemptions that currently let many working-class families avoid income taxes.”
KOCH DEMAND #3:
DEMEAN PROGRAMS THAT LEVEL THE ECONOMIC PLAYING FIELD AS “FREE STUFF”
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Marco Rubio:
“‘If you watched that debate last night it looked like something from the early ‘80s,’ Rubio said on ‘Fox and Friends.’ ‘It was basically a liberal verses liberal debate about who was going to give away the most free stuff: Free college education, free college education for people illegally in this country, free health care, free everything.’ ‘Their answer to every problem in America is a government program and a tax increase. That’s all they prescribe time and time again,’ he continued.” [Talking Points Memo, 10/14/15]
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Rand Paul:
“In delivering a tea party response to the State of the Union, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) suggested that President Obama has won over lower-income voters with ‘free stuff,’ an echo of Mitt Romney’s comments on the 47 percent and ‘gifts’ to key demographics. ‘The president offers you free stuff, but his policies keep you poor,’ Paul said, adding that ‘the ranks of the poor have swelled’ during Obama’s tenure.” [Washington Post, 2/12/13]
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Jeb Bush:
“‘Our message is one of hope and aspiration,’ [Jeb Bush] said at the East Cooper Republican Women’s Club annual Shrimp Dinner. ‘It isn’t one of division and get in line and we’ll take care of you with free stuff. Our message is one that is uplifting — that says you can achieve earned success.’” [Washington Post, 9/24/15] |
AND THE REST? THEY’RE ALL THE SAME.
Chris Christie: Christie suggested that raising taxes on the wealthy was part of a “gimme gimme gimme attitude.”
Rick Santorum: Santorum: “I don’t want to make black people’s lives better by giving them somebody else’s money.”
KOCH DEMAND #4:
OPPOSE EQUAL PAY FOR WOMEN AT ALL COSTS
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Marco Rubio:
“Republicans, seeking to mitigate the fallout after recent debates over women’s health have cast them in a harsh light among female voters, were careful not to be seen as rooting against the cause of equal pay. Instead, they decried the bill as a political stunt. ‘It’s pure election-year politics,’ said Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL). ‘This bill reads more to me like some sort of a welfare plan for trial lawyers.’” [Talking Points Memo, 6/5/12; Senate roll call vote 115, 6/5/12; Senate roll call vote 103, 4/9/14; Senate roll call vote 260, 9/10/14; Senate roll call vote 262, 9/15/14]
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John Kasich:
“Women working in Republican Gov. John Kasich’s office earn $9.81-an-hour less, on average, than men, the Dayton Daily News analysis published Sunday showed. That’s the highest gender pay gap among statewide officeholders, according to the newspaper’s study of Ohio Department of Administrative Services data. The gender gap compares to $3.99-an-hour under former Gov. Ted Strickland.” [Associated Press, 4/21/14] |
Jeb Bush:
“‘What’s the Paycheck Fairness Act?’ Bush asked, in an exchange captured by the liberal opposition research outfit American Bridge. Once the man he was speaking with defined it as a bill that would ensure that women get ‘equal pay for equal work,’ Bush took issue with his phrasing. ‘Equal pay for the same work, not for equal work — I think that’s the problem with it. I think there’s a definition issue,’ he said, before declining to say whether or not he thought Land should support the legislation.” [The Hill, 10/15/14] |
AND THE REST? THEY’RE ALL THE SAME.
Donald Trump: Trump said equal pay legislation could lead to “an economy where it’s no longer free enterprise economy.”
Ted Cruz: Cruz voted against the Paycheck Fairness Act multiple times. [S. 2199, 4/1/14; Senate roll call vote 260, 9/10/14; Senate roll call vote 262, 9/15/14]
Carly Fiorina: Fiorina called equal pay legislation “tokens” and “gestures.”
Rand Paul: Paul voted against the Paycheck Fairness Act multiple times and compared equal pay legislation to the Soviet Politburo. [Senate roll call vote 115, 6/5/12; Senate roll call vote 103, 4/9/14; Senate roll call vote 260, 9/10/14; Senate roll call vote 262, 9/15/14]
Chris Christie: Christie vetoed what the Star-Ledger called “two sensible reforms that would help prevent women from getting cheated in their paychecks.”
Lindsey Graham: Graham voted against the Paycheck Fairness Act and the Fair Pay Act. [Senate roll call vote 14, 1/22/09; Senate roll call vote 115, 6/5/12; Senate roll call vote 103, 4/9/14; Senate roll call vote 262, 9/15/14]
Rick Santorum: Santorum opposed the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, calling it “a trial lawyer’s bill.”
Bobby Jindal: Jindal voted against the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act.
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