Democrats challenge Nancy Pelosi on taxes
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Pelosi is her party's chief advocate for hiking tax rates for folks in the top income brackets. | AP Photo
CloseBy JONATHAN ALLEN | 9/13/10 4:31 AM EDT Updated: 9/13/10 7:38 AM EDT
Red-district Democrats are pressuring Speaker Nancy Pelosi to extend Bush-era income tax rates for all brackets, revealing a high-stakes rift between the party's vulnerable moderates and its safe liberals as the issue increasingly dominates the national debate.
POLITICO has obtained a draft of a letter from rank-and-file lawmakers to Pelosi and Majority Leader Steny Hoyer urging them not to let tax rates rise for Americans at the highest income levels.
"We believe in times of economic recovery it makes good sense to maintain things as they are in the short term, to provide families and businesses the certainty required to plan and make sound budget decisions," the House members write in a letter that was being circulated for signatures on Friday and is expected to be delivered today or Tuesday.
Reps. Jim Matheson (Utah), Glenn Nye (Virginia), Melissa Bean (Ill.) and Gary Peters (Mich.) drafted the letter and are working to gather support, mostly from the moderate Blue Dog and New Democrat coalitions, for at least a temporary extension of the rates for top income earners as well as those in the lower brackets.
Pelosi, who rose to power as a leader of the Progressive Caucus, is her party's chief advocate for hiking tax rates for folks in the top two income brackets while freezing them for couples making $250,000 or less.
The situation may well be lose-lose-lose for Democrats. If they raise taxes on higher income Americans, they risk alienating moderate voters and campaign contributors in closely contested races in Republican-leaning districts. If they freeze the rates for everyone, they risk depressing an already deflated liberal base in districts all across the country — including those represented by centrist Democrats. And, if they kick the can down the road with a one- or two-year extension for the highest earners, President Barack Obama will have to wrestle with the issue again heading into his 2012 re-election campaign.
But the battle represents a risk for Republicans, too. They can't afford to be pegged as promoting the interests of the wealthy at the cost of the middle class amid a continued economic malaise.
Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chairman Chris Van Hollen and Obama have accused Republicans of holding the middle class "hostage" because they want all of the tax rates extended.
On Sunday, House Minority Leader John Boehner sought to counter that thrust by telling CBS' Bob Schieffer that he would not vote against an extension of just the set of rates for lower and middle classes — even as he works to include the upper incomes in the final version of legislation.
"If the only option I have is to vote for those at 250 and below, of course I'm going to do that. But I'm going to do everything I can to fight to make sure that we extend the current tax rates for all Americans," Boehner said.
His remarks touched off a fierce, campaign-style partisan exchange with the White House.
Read more: politico.com |
