Virtually all Americans face the threat of a federal tax increase in January, if Congress doesn’t act in the next few weeks to reinstate the so-called Bush-era tax cuts. Iowa Congressman Steve King, a Republican, says there is a growing consensus among members of his party on the extension of the tax cuts.
“We’re determined that we not split out any brackets, that all brackets get treated the same,” King says. “If anybody gets a tax increase, everybody gets a tax increase. That’s the thing we’re going to stand on. Whether we’re able to hold that or not, I don’t know.”
Democrats and Republicans are bickering over how the wealthiest Americans will be taxed. King says President Obama’s stance on the issue is becoming more difficult to read. “The president seemed to be, a month or so ago, determined to increase the taxes on the highest bracket,” King says. “Now he seems to have come to a position where there’s a higher bracket than the highest bracket that he would want to hold out to increase the taxes on. The discussion becomes, will it be permanent and will it be all brackets?”
King says the fight over the tax cuts is centered in the Senate. He says the House version of the legislation will still depend on outgoing Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat from California. “Nancy Pelosi could probably still, with the votes she has, pass most anything she decides to pass over here.”
Congress is in recess this week for the Thanksgiving holiday.
By Jerry Oster, WNAX, Yankton