Tax Cuts

Floor Speech

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Mr. KHANNA. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to discuss the fiscally irresponsible one big, beautiful bill that simply gives tax breaks for the richest Americans and takes away services for working- and middle- class families.

Here are the facts: We currently have about a $36 trillion debt, and we are spending right now $2 trillion more every year than we take in. The Republican budget would add $3.8 trillion to that deficit. It will do that over 10 years.

How are they going to get those $3.8 trillion of tax breaks? Let me just outline who those tax breaks are going to go to: $96 billion a year are going to go to people who make over a million dollars a year. If you are a millionaire in America, you are going to get about $82,000 a year in tax breaks. If you are making under $100,000, you get about $750 in tax breaks. That is $82,000 of tax breaks for the millionaires, and $750 to working- and middle-class families. That is not a fair deal.

Democrats believe that we need to raise taxes on people who are making over a million dollars, not give them $82,000 a year in tax breaks.

By the way, the tax breaks for those millionaires and billionaires are permanent over 10 years. The tax breaks the Democrats support for working-class families, like no tax on tips, they only want them for 4 years. Democrats have been fighting to get the no tax on tips for 10 years. Republicans say: No, for working families, we only want 4 years. Tax breaks for the billionaires in my district in Silicon Valley, for those we want 10 years.

Then what are they cutting? They are cutting $750 billion in Medicaid benefits. That is just a fact. Go Google it. You will see the cuts. They claim that people aren't going to lose their healthcare, but the independent CBO says that up to 14 million Americans may lose their healthcare. Up to a million of American children, kids born in the United States, may lose their healthcare. It is the largest cut to Medicaid in the history of this country, all to finance $96 billion a year of tax breaks to the millionaires and billionaires. Those are the facts.

Look, CBO did an analysis, and they said that the top 10 percent in America are going to benefit enormously from this bill. If you are in the top 10 percent, if you make over a million dollars, over a half a million dollars, you should applaud.

The bottom 10 percent, the folks who are working hard, struggling to make ends meet, the truck drivers, people who work at Walmart, nurses, HVAC technicians are going to lose 4 percent.

This bill benefits those who are already doing well and ignores those who are working hard and struggling the most. It is the exact opposite of what we should be doing.

Even Donald Trump challenged the Congress to say: Raise taxes a bit on the rich. I am fine with it. Did the Republicans do that? No. They cut them further for the wealthy.

People ask what do Democrats believe? Democrats believe that the tax breaks and the tax cuts should be going to the working and middle class in this country. Democrats believe we should be taxing more the people who are making a million and a billion dollars a year. We believe we should not be cutting Medicaid, essential healthcare services that help families, that support hospitals, and that support the health of so many seniors in this country.

This debate is about whose side are Members on. Are my colleagues for those who already benefited from the income divide, or for the working and middle class? I hope enough Republicans on the other side will say ``no'' to these cuts of working-class benefits.

I hope enough Republicans will say ``no'' to the tax breaks for the millionaires and billionaires, and will say ``no'' to piling on more debt which will raise interest rates, hurting our economic growth, exploding our trade deficit because of our reliance on foreign firms and foreign investment, and crippling ordinary Americans' ability to get loans.

It is bad economics. We need a new approach.

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