Photo credit: Gage Skidmore
Ordinary taxpayers are hoping a few Republican heroes have the courage to stand up against a brazenly unfair tax plan that will eventually raise taxes on most Americans to pay for massive tax cuts for multimillion-dollar corporations and the super wealthy, including the president and his family. But Wisconsin voters shouldn’t be fooled into believing their own Republican Sen. Ron Johnson is such a hero just because he’s fraudulently trying to present himself as one.
The truth is Johnson, the first Republican to publicly declare his opposition to both the House and Senate Republican tax bills, simply wants to grab a bigger tax cut for himself. His phony cover story is he’s a champion of small business. “These businesses truly are the engines of innovation and job creation throughout our economy, and they should not be left behind,” Johnson declared. What this millionaire U.S. senator really cares about are four not-so-small businesses he and his wife, Jane, own in Oshkosh.
Remember Pacur, the plastics manufacturing company in Oshkosh founded by Johnson’s father-in-law and brother-in-law before he married into the family, quickly rising to CEO? Johnson still owns a 5% share of that company—worth between $1 million and $5 million, according to his financial disclosure forms. Johnson and his wife also own 100% of the commercial real estate rented to Pacur—estimated to be worth $5 million to $25 million. He owns smaller stakes in a real estate investment trust and a land development company. All four of Johnson’s businesses qualify for taxation as “pass through” entities under Republican tax plans.
Conflict of Interest?
In the Senate tax bill, the whopping tax cut for major corporations would be from 35% to 20%, but wealthy individuals whose income comes from “pass through” businesses would only be able to deduct 17.4% from taxation and would receive a much smaller tax cut (from 39.6% to 31.8%). So, if Republicans want Johnson’s vote, they’re going to have to give him a much bigger piece of the pie.
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Anyone who still thinks Johnson is looking out for the little guy needs to realize “pass through” tax benefits don’t just go to small businesses such as dry cleaners, repair shops and actual mom and pop businesses; like most other Republican tax schemes, the really enormous tax advantages go to millionaires like Johnson and very large businesses, including every National Football League team, Fiat Chrysler, Koch Industries’ Georgia-Pacific subsidiary, hedge funds and (surprise!) most of the Trump family companies.
That last connection, of course, is the reason Johnson is likely to get the changes he wants to fill his own pockets and will end up voting for the bill. If Johnson and other Republicans were remotely interested in cutting taxes to benefit the middle class, we wouldn’t see such petty jealousy over which millionaire business owners get the biggest tax cuts. Republicans would simply pass substantial, permanent tax cuts for the middle class, hard-pressed folks who really need the money. Instead, all of the Republican tax cuts for the middle class are temporary. In just a few years, they vanish and, for many, suddenly become tax increases. Large, permanent Republican tax cuts are reserved for corporations, millionaires and billionaires.
Nobody Likes Your Plan!
Most people aren’t as dumb as Republicans think they are. A recent Quinnipiac University poll showed 52% oppose the evolving Republican tax plan and only 25% support it. Overwhelmingly, ordinary folks believe—with good reason—that corporations and wealthy people at the top pay far too little in taxes, and people like themselves pay too much. This is being confirmed once again. We see all of the nasty little ways Republicans are funding those enormous tax breaks for the Trump family and their party’s billionaire donors: Ugly little things like eliminating tax deductions for enormous, uninsured medical expenses for special needs children and catastrophic illnesses; ending deductions for interest on the staggering student debt college graduates will take decades to pay off; and yet another Republican attempt to destroy health care for at least 13 million low-income people.
Of course, Sen. Ron Johnson seldom pretends to represent anyone less wealthy than himself. He told students at New Berlin High School recently that no American had any right to health care or even to food, clothing or shelter unless they could afford it. Johnson claimed the only American rights were to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. “Past that point, everything else is a limited resource that we have to use our opportunities given to us so that we can afford those things,” Johnson declared.
When a U.S. senator is ignorant of all the specific rights guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution, it’s no surprise he believes he has a special right as a millionaire senator to demand a bigger tax cut for himself when all the other millionaires and billionaires are getting theirs.
