Before Critical Vote, Wyden Urges Republican Support for Tax Cuts for Children and Families, Small Businesses
In a few minutes the Senate will vote on the Tax Relief for American Workers and Families Act. There’s been a lot of discussion and debate this week. I’ll make just a few final points.
Republicans are talking a lot these days, trying to convince Americans that they’re the ones who support children and families -- not Democrats.
They talk about supporting small businesses. They talk about competing with China. They talk about how terrible it is that nobody can afford a home in America. They talk about cracking down on fraud in government programs.
The bill we’re going to vote on shortly helps with each and every one of those issues, and we’ll see whether Senate Republicans really want to help. We’ll see if they’re offering anything more than talk.
Over the last couple of days, I’ve read a lot of comments from Republican Senators who say they ought to wait, and if they take control of the Senate they’ll write a better bill.
Better for whom?
One thing I’m sure of -- it won’t be a better bill for the 16 million kids who stand to benefit from the proposal the Senate will be voting on momentarily.
And it won’t come as any consolation to families who are getting clobbered on rent, or the small businesses that are going to fail if they don’t get help now.
The House passed this bill back in January, shortly after Chairman Smith and I introduced it. It got 357 votes, almost an even split between the two parties.
The only reason this bill didn’t become law six months ago is because of delay on the part of Senate Republicans. I offered to make changes, but the delays only continued. In old-school basketball terms, it’s the four-corner offense. Stall and drain the clock. But the millions of people who are hurting cannot afford for us to wait any longer.
And the reality is, when it comes to tax policy debates here in Congress, this is the easy stuff. The difficult issues do not get agreement from 357 members of the House. And the tax debate gets a lot harder next year when Congress is going to have to deal with trillions of dollars in tax changes coming down the pike. If Senate Republicans cannot work across the aisle or work with the House on this set of easy issues, that’s a pretty bad sign for how next year might go.
I’ll close with this. Every Senator will now have a choice, and the result here is not predetermined.
Republicans can choose to side with children and families.
They can choose to side with people struggling to pay the rent.
They can choose to side with small businesses.
They can choose to help victims of disasters.
And they can choose to pay for it by fighting fraud.
They can make that choice -- or they can continue with excuses, empty talk, and what are sure to be their plans to lock in even more Trump handouts to big corporations and the wealthy.
I hope they make the right choice.
I strongly urge my colleagues to vote yes and side with children and families all over this country, and I yield the floor.
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