Senate Democrats passed the bill erroneously entitled Inflation Reduction Act 2022 by Vice President Kamala Harris casting the tie-breaking vote of 51-50 on Sunday.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer praised the measure passing. He indicated democrats were “elated.” The senator described the magnitude of what they had accomplished by sticking together.
Schumer boasted, “I’m really confident that the Inflation Reduction Act will endure as one of the defining features of the 21st century.”
Democrats plan to pay for any spending, roughly $400 billion, by eliminating tax loopholes that allow major corporations to pay little or nothing to the federal government, in addition to implementing a 1% stock buyback tax, according to the Washington Times.
However, Republicans condemned the passage with opposite viewpoints of the bill’s grandeur. They decried it as a “reckless taxing and spending spree,” predicting that low- and middle-income Americans would be the ones to bear the tax burdens. They said the bill will do nothing to combat inflation, especially in the short term, and will imperil the economy further while warning that Democrats will pay the price in November.
“Democrats have proven over and over they simply do not care about middle-class families’ priorities. They have spent 18 months proving that. They just spent hundreds of billions of dollars to prove it again,” said Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. “But the working Americans they have failed will be writing Democrats’ report cards in three months’ time.”
Texas Senator Ted Cruz and Louisiana Senator John Kennedy blasted the bill, aiming at the taxes.
Kennedy stressed that “everyone, not just those making over $400,000 per year but everyone,” will feel the bite of higher taxes as the Inflation Reduction Act goes into effect.
It’s a special kind of stupid to raise taxes during both a recession and inflation—that’s called stagflation, which is what we have right now as a result of President Biden’s policies. pic.twitter.com/VND3V58JuD
— John Kennedy (@SenJohnKennedy) August 7, 2022
In case you missed it, Cruz focused on the 87,000 new IRS agents being added.
According to Cruz, the measure would make the IRS larger than the State Department, the FBI, the Pentagon and the Border Patrol combined. The senator labeled it “a terrible idea!” He offered an amendment to curb the IRS growth. It didn’t pass.
The bill heads to the House where a vote is expected this week.
