It’s no secret that Democrats view the American people’s money as their own money with which they may do whatever they please, Save Jerseyans.
One of the new GOP House Majority’s first legislative initiatives is driving that point home. On Tuesday, Fox News reported that the McCarthy-led House would vote on a bill to (1) eliminate the IRS and (2) replace the federal income tax with a consumption tax. The first U.S. income tax was levied in 1861 to help fund Union war efforts; Congress subsequently adopted the Internal Revenue Act in 1862.
A consumption tax would (as the name implies) tax the purchase of goods or services rather than income. The more you consume? The more tax you would pay.
The consumption tax component SHOULD, you would think, be the more controversial aspect of this whole thing. It’s not; in fact, Rep. Mikie Sherrill (D, NJ-11) took to Twitter today to throw a shit fit over insuffient IRS funding:
Failing to fully fund the IRS allows high-income individuals like the former president to pay essentially nothing in taxes, resulting in hard-working New Jerseyans shouldering a disproportionate and undue tax burden.
— Rep. Mikie Sherrill (@RepSherrill) January 10, 2023
Republicans in Congress want to allow tax cheats to unfairly place more of the burden on honest Americans. I will work to ensure we have a fully functioning tax collection agency; something that is fundamental to American democracy and our economy.
— Rep. Mikie Sherrill (@RepSherrill) January 10, 2023
“Failing to fully fund the IRS allows high-income individuals like the former president to pay essentially nothing in taxes, resulting in hard-working New Jerseyans shouldering a disproportionate and undue tax burden,” Sherrill tweeted.
“Fully fund?”
Polling finds that the IRS is unsurprisingly the least popular federal agency, and that’s for good reason.
Sherrill is absolutely full of it. The oft-cited 87,000 new IRS agents funded by the “Inflation Reduction Act” would inevitably target America’s many small businesses and freelance workers who, unlike the “high-income individuals” she cites (read: Donald Trump), can’t afford an army of tax attorneys and ace accountants to minimize the fallout from an audit. In fact, those earning under $400,000 annually account for $20 billion in federal revenue by the Inflation Reduction Act’s math.
The Democrats may want to think long and hard about the political wisdom of going to bat for the IRS at the expense of hard-working Americans.
