President Joe Biden.
AP / Manuel Balce Ceneta
- Corporate groups are stepping up their efforts to stop the Democrats’ planned corporate tax hikes.
- The Washington Post reported that the Chamber of Commerce is organizing a lobbying campaign with other large corporations.
- Corporations want to keep the tax rules they set out in Trump’s 2017 Tax Act.
- Check out Insider’s business page for more stories.
Prominent corporate groups are lobbying heavily to smash portions of the $ 3.5 trillion Democratic spending plan, which includes proposed corporate tax hikes, the Washington Post reported Tuesday.
The effort includes organizations like the American Chamber of Commerce, the Business Roundtable, the National Association of Manufacturers, and the RATE Coalition, the Post reported.
Companies in their ranks include Disney, part of RATE; Apple, part of the Business Roundtable; and ExxonMobil, which are part of the National Association of Manufacturers.
The Post reported that the Chamber of Commerce is in the early stages of a campaign that includes ads for Democrats and traditional lobbying in Congress, the newspaper said, citing three sources that remained anonymous to share internal decision-making.
The bipartisan spending plan the Democrats are currently working on would expand Medicare, establish a national program of paid family and sick leave, and include a free community college, child support, and climate crisis management initiatives, among other provisions.
The Democrats intend to approve it through reconciliation, a way to bypass the staunch opposition of the GOP and secure its passage by a simple majority. For this process to work, the Democrats in the 50-50 Senate must be in lockstep.
A sustained campaign organized by corporate groups could increase Democratic disagreement over how much taxes should be increased on the largest corporations. Corporations are largely reluctant to press the Democrats to reverse the tax treatment they laid out in President Donald Trump’s 2017 tax bill, which cut corporate taxes from 35% to 21% and provided exemptions from taxing foreign profits.
Former Democratic Senator Blanche Lincoln told the Post that the string of corporate tax hikes could set the US economy back in competition with China and “could have devastating consequences for American workers.” Lincoln serves as the primary adviser to the RATE coalition.
The Democrats are on board with the corporate tax hike, but they disagree on how much it should go up. President Joe Biden unveiled a two-part infrastructure plan in the spring that would increase corporate taxes from 21% to 28%, which amounts to a partial withdrawal of Republican tax law.
“I’m not trying to punish anyone, but damn it, maybe it’s because I’m from a middle-class neighborhood, I’m sick of ordinary people being fleeced,” Biden said in a speech on Jan.
However, some Democrats have already expressed reluctance to raise taxes to this level, warning that doing so could hurt the competitiveness of American companies. Sens. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Mark Warner of Virginia both advocate a smaller increase in corporate tax, with Manchin supporting a 25% rate instead.
Senator Bernie Sanders tore up the first signs of the campaign on Tuesday. “The rich and big corporations are getting richer, and their lobbyists are doing everything they can to protect their wealth and greed,” he wrote on Twitter. “Not this time.”