Tax Reform

Floor Speech

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Mr. McCONNELL. Madam President, on one final matter, later today, President Trump is visiting the great State of Indiana. He is joining Hoosiers to celebrate the new jobs and prosperity our Republican agenda is delivering to communities in Indiana and all over the country. After years of Democratic policies that made life harder for job creators, the United States of America is officially open for business once again.

Surveys show that since President Trump and this Republican Congress were elected, the percentage of small and independent employers feeling confident about expanding their businesses has nearly tripled. The amount that employers spend on wages, salaries, and benefits for American workers grew more in 2017 than in any calendar year of the Obama administration. The number of Americans receiving unemployment benefits is the lowest--the lowest--since 1973. Let me say that again. The number of Americans receiving unemployment benefits is the lowest it has been since 1973. Richard Nixon was in the White House back then. Republicans have focused like a laser on getting Washington out of the way. More job opportunities, higher pay, and greater prosperity are already reaching middle-class Americans.

My colleague Senator Young has been sharing some of the great news that awaits the President when he gets to Indiana. He has heard from constituents like Donald from Noblesville. Donald said:

I don't consider myself rich, but applying next year's tax changes to this year's income, I'll pay over $1,000 less in taxes next year. Everyone benefits with the new tax cuts.

A Bloomington resident named Cathy said this about her husband's tax reform bonus:

We have never had this happen. It was much appreciated.

First Farmers Bank & Trust is raising wages, writing employee bonus checks, and investing more in development for the communities it serves, with 34 branches all across Indiana.

There are stories like these being written all over the country-- largely because Republicans rolled back job-killing regulations and cut taxes significantly for working families and for small businesses.

Oddly, our Democratic colleagues can't bring themselves to admit this is a good thing. Even when the facts show our growing economy is making life better for middle-class Americans, they try to shrug off the facts and fall back on the same old class warfare rhetoric. Even when people like Donald and Cathy explain how tax reform is helping them, Democrats scoff at their household finances, saying multi-thousand-dollar tax cuts are just ``crumbs.''

Crumbs? Maybe in New York or San Francisco, but in Kentucky, where I come from, working families don't see their tax cuts, bonuses, and pay raises as crumbs. I have a hunch it is the same in Indiana.

It is curious that only one of Indiana's Senators voted to give Hoosiers these tax cuts and these new job opportunities. Indiana's senior Senator voted in lockstep with Democratic leaders to block tax reform from ever taking effect. Instead of working with Republicans and the President to keep the new prosperity coming, he and his colleagues have chosen to obstruct and resist on nearly every subject.

Just the other day, the Democratic leader in the House declared she plans to campaign on repealing the tax reform--that is, the Democratic leader in the U.S. House--campaign on repealing the tax reform. Tax cuts versus tax hikes, that is about as clear a contrast as you can imagine. Fortunately, for Hoosiers, Kentuckians, and all the other communities that are finally growing again after years of atrophy, Republicans will defend the American people's tax cuts and defend their new jobs.

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