Hatch On President’s Call To Raise Taxes

Utah Senator Says, “America has a debt crisis not because citizens are taxed too little, but because government spends too much.”

WASHINGTON – At an event on the cost of tax increases to America’s economy this afternoon, U.S. Senator Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), Ranking Member of the Senate Finance Committee, blasted the President’s call for tax hikes and for a failure to provide a concrete plan to solve the debt crisis. The Finance Committee has jurisdiction over taxes, Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security.

Follows are Hatch’s remarks as prepared for delivery:

“I wish I could say Happy Tax Day Eve, but there’s really nothing good or happy about it.
We have an over $14 trillion debt problem in this country that could reach 90 percent of our nation’s economic output by the end of the decade.

“The President’s response yesterday? Well, it wasn’t really a response. It wasn’t a plan. It was more of the same liberal ideology: raise taxes, play class warfare, and attack Paul Ryan.

“Frankly, Democrats seem to be hardwired to believe that the government’s money isn’t the people’s money – it’s their money.

“And that’s the problem – we don’t have a revenue problem, we have a spending problem. Federal spending is up to 25 percent of our nation’s economic output – up from the 20.6 percent post World War II average.

“The President yesterday called for more taxes: tax hikes on our job creators – the same tax hikes that won’t go through this Congress and that even if they magically became law wouldn’t even remotely bring down our debt.

“He called for tax reform, but not to make our overly-burdensome code more efficient, but to spend more of the American people’s money.

“He talked about how the rich need to pay their fair share – how we shouldn’t support the rich at the expense of the poor and the middle class.

“In fact, David Plouffe, the President’s Senior Advisor and former campaign manager, had this to say about the President’s proposal. ‘People like him…who've been very fortunate in life, have the ability to pay a little bit more.’

“That’s big of him. We hear this quite a bit from rich Democrats. Please tax us more.

“Well, the day before what is typically tax filing day, I feel obligated to inform Mr. Plouffe, the President, and all of those rich liberal Democrats who are eager to pay higher taxes, that they can do just that.

“They can write a check to the IRS and make an extra payment on their tax returns to pay down the federal debt. There’s still time before the filing deadline for them to give Uncle Sam some more money.

“But seriously, raising taxes has never and will never solve our deficit crisis. When taxes are hiked in the name of tackling our debt, they’ve been used for more spending.

“I’ll say it again, America has a debt crisis not because citizens are taxed too little, but because government spends too much.”

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