Cantor Rejects Obama Tax Cut Plan
The Hill reports:
The Obama administration’s hopes of reaching a tax deal with Republicans that would decouple rates on the rich from the middle class appear dead.
House GOP Whip Eric Cantor (Va.) threw cold water on the proposed plan, which would temporarily extend tax cuts for the wealthy while permanently extending tax cuts for the middle class. “Taxes shouldn't be going up on anybody right now,” Cantor said.
Cantor’s comments Monday evening on Fox follow similar remarks from Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), the incoming senior Republican on the Senate’s tax-writing committee. While Hatch expressed an open mind to extending tax cuts past the 2012 election rather than permanently extending the rates, he also ruled out the decoupling proposal.
Hatch said he would be open to a compromise with the White House that would extend all of the Bush tax rates for at least two years.
Republicans do not want to separate the timelines for extending the rates because doing so would make it easier in the future to let tax breaks on upper-income people expire. Cantor on Monday also said the decoupling proposal would send a signal to small businesses that their taxes will rise, which he said would hurt the economy.
“No. I mean, one of the ideas that we've seen floated was this decoupling ... That is a ... signal right then and there that we're going to raise taxes on small businesses,” Cantor, the soon-to-be majority leader said. “That’s exactly what we don't need right now. What we need is certainty.”
All of the tax cuts are set to expire at the end of the year, and President Obama has made it clear he is willing to compromise to prevent taxes on the middle class from rising. The White House previously supported ending tax breaks for families with income above $250,000, but the administration has made it clear it is willing to deal since the mid-term election, which saw Republicans gain at least 60 House seats.
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