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senate finance committee
Why Republicans Should Champion Clean Energy
When we really look underneath the surface, it’s clear that saving the Inflation Reduction Act clean energy tax credits, including the Domestic Content Bonus Credit, would advance Republicans’ own goals.
Jun 21, 2025
Last month, the Republican-led House of Representatives passed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, or OBBBA, a comprehensive budget reconciliation bill that aims to lengthen major provisions of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act passed during President Donald Trump’s first presidency, currently set to expire by the end of this year. Earlier this week, the Republican-led Senate Finance Committee introduced its version of the bill. Among several provisions intending to reduce the federal government’s deficit, the bill would majorly scale back clean energy tax credits instituted by the Inflation Reduction Act, or IRA, signed into law by President Joe Biden in 2022.
In doing so, the OBBBA would terminate the IRA’s Domestic Content Bonus Credit, which provides an additional 10% refund for clean energy projects that use American-made technology. Over the last three years, this IRA tax credit has boosted American manufacturing, created thousands of jobs here in the United States, and strengthened our domestic energy supply chain.
As our Senators from both sides of the aisle consider the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, those who believe in American economic growth and individual liberty should champion reversing course from the bill introduced by the Senate Finance Committee and keeping the IRA’s clean energy tax credits. The Domestic Content Bonus Credit in particular advances Republican values while enhancing America’s standing in the international energy market. This America-first, market-based policy generates American economic competition and innovation, while giving middle-class homeowners greater choice over their energy systems.
Rather than hurting the business of crucial American companies like Tandem PV, Republicans should champion clean energy because it aligns with core conservative principles.
Most new energy contributing to the American electricity grid is clean—including solar and wind—because of how cheap, fast, and naturally abundant these sources are. Indeed, in 2024 alone, 95% of new capacity to the American electricity grid came from clean energy. Because of this reality, the OBBBA’s impacts on federal clean energy incentives would reduce overall energy additions to the American electricity grid by about half by 2035, undermining American energy growth.
Meanwhile, China continues to maintain a near monopoly over solar energy technology, possessing an over 80% share of the international marketplace and currently on a growth trajectory. In 2023 alone, China installed more solar panels than America has over the course of its history and saw its solar panel exports increase by 38%. How did China come to lead the global solar energy technology market? In part, through government subsidies, including cheaper land for solar panel factories and low-interest loans to solar panel companies to expand these critical, nascent industries and spur their success. It is clear from a comparative perspective that the Domestic Content Bonus Credit is essential to strengthening American global energy leadership: In a market that China dominates, this tax credit helps American solar energy technology manufacturers compete.
I spoke to Scott Wharton, CEO of Tandem PV, an American solar energy technology company focusing on groundbreaking tandem perovskite solar panels, about 30% more efficient and powerful than the typical solar panel. With a perovskite layer 200 times thinner than silicon, the production of tandem perovskite solar panels requires only 10% of the energy needed to make conventional panels—a true testimony to American ingenuity. While in 2022 about 88% of U.S. solar panel shipments industry-wide were imports, primarily from Asia, Tandem PV announced plans in 2025 to construct a commercial-scale tandem perovskite solar panel manufacturing facility in the United States. Scott’s plans will increase American energy independence, growth, and innovation, enabling us to harness the abundant power of the Sun to power our future prosperity.
Scott said that Congress’s intention to scrap the Inflation Reduction Act clean energy tax credits would hurt his business, as American-made tandem perovskite solar energy technology would become less financially attractive to investors looking to support new capacity to the electrical grid. Given that the U.S. has developed the most advanced tandem perovskite technology globally, the current version of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act would adversely impact innovation, jobs, and growth in an emerging American industry. Moreover, Scott emphasized that the bill would undermine individual homeowners’ choice and liberty over their energy systems, as it would reduce their ability to own their energy production and increase their reliance on the greater energy grid.
It’s easy to get caught up in a game of partisan politics that puts emotional loyalty to party over rational best of interest of our country. When we really look underneath the surface, it’s clear that saving the Inflation Reduction Act clean energy tax credits, including the Domestic Content Bonus Credit, would advance Republicans’ own goals: long-term American economic and energy growth and international competitiveness through market-based solutions that promote innovation, create American jobs, and increase individual liberty. Rather than hurting the business of crucial American companies like Tandem PV, Republicans should champion clean energy because it aligns with core conservative principles. Let’s keep our clean energy tax credits—for America’s families, businesses, and future.
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Senate GOP Dumps Gasoline on 'Five-Alarm Fire' by Proposing Even Deeper Medicaid Cuts
"We're watching in real time as Senate Republicans line up to gut healthcare for millions of Americans in order to pay for tax cuts for themselves, their wealthy donors, and big businesses."
Jun 17, 2025
Senate Republicans on Monday proposed cutting Medicaid even more aggressively than their House colleagues to help offset the cost of trillions of dollars in tax breaks that would disproportionately benefit the wealthiest Americans.
The legislative text unveiled by the GOP-controlled Senate Finance Committee is a central component of the sprawling reconciliation package that Republicans are hoping to send to President Donald Trump's desk by next month.
The bill contains broader Medicaid work requirements than the House-passed legislation, expanding the ineffective and punitive mandates to low-income adults with children over the age of 14.
The Senate version would also sharply limit provider taxes that states use to fund their Medicaid programs. Edwin Park, a research professor at Georgetown University's Center for Children and Families, warned the provision would "devastate" state finances, particularly where lawmakers have expanded Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act (ACA).
"This will create huge budget holes over time, some in as little as two years, forcing states to make severe, highly damaging cuts," Park wrote in an analysis of the new legislation.
"Senate Republicans have made this cruel, heartless bill even worse as they continue on their endless pursuit to destroy our healthcare system."
Senate Republicans released the bill text less than two weeks after the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimated that the House-passed reconciliation package would strip healthcare from nearly 11 million Americans over the next decade—a number that rises to 16 million when accounting for the GOP's refusal to renew ACA tax credits set to expire at the end of the year.
Even more people would lose healthcare if Republicans adopt the Senate plan, analysts and advocates warned. One recent study estimated that around 51,000 additional people across the U.S. would die unnecessarily each year due to large-scale health insurance losses caused by the GOP's proposals.
"It shocks the conscience that Senate Republican leaders saw the impacts of the House bill—16 million more people uninsured and millions losing help buying groceries, including families with children—and chose to double down," said Sharon Parrott, president of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
Leslie Dach, chair of the advocacy group Protect Our Care, said in a statement that "this bill was already a five-alarm fire for American healthcare, and Senate Republicans have just poured gasoline on it."
"Contrary to what they've repeatedly promised, Republicans are torching Medicaid, ripping apart the Affordable Care Act, and leaving 16 million people without the critical care they need, all so Trump and the GOP can funnel more money to their billionaire and corporate friends," said Dach. "Seniors will be thrown out of nursing homes, people fighting cancer will be cut off from treatment, and rural hospitals will shutter. Senate Republicans have made this cruel, heartless bill even worse as they continue on their endless pursuit to destroy our healthcare system."
If Senate Republicans adopt the proposed changes, the House would have to pass the reconciliation bill again before it can reach Trump's desk. One House Republican, granted anonymity by Politico, said "hell no" in response to the Senate language pertaining to Medicaid provider taxes, a signal that the proposal is likely to face intraparty opposition.
But experts stressed that both the House and Senate versions of the reconciliation bill would be disastrous for low-income Americans and a boon for the rich.
"Now that we've seen Senate text, we can say for certain: Either the House or the Senate version would be the largest transfer from the poor to the rich in a single law in history," wrote Bobby Kogan, senior director of federal budget policy at the Center for American Progress.
"Each would kick millions of people off their health insurance and each would rip food assistance away from millions of households," Kogan noted. "Each would increase deficits by trillions of dollars while making the poorest Americans poorer and making the richest Americans richer."
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Privatization Warnings Flash Red as Senate Republicans Advance Dr. Oz for Medicare Chief
"Given Dr. Oz's history of basically acting as a salesman for Medicare Advantage, putting him in charge of regulating these middlemen would be like letting the fox guard the henhhouse," said one Democratic senator.
Mar 25, 2025
The U.S. Senate Finance Committee voted along party lines Tuesday to advance the nomination of Dr. Mehmet Oz, President Donald Trump's nominee to head the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, a move that drew widespread rebuke from consumer advocates and others who pointed to the celebrity surgeon's advocacy for private Medicare Advantage plans and other red flags.
The Finance Committee voted 14-13 to send Oz's nomination to a full Senate vote, with Chair Mike Crapo (R-Idaho) hailing the former television talk show host's "years of experience as an acclaimed physician and public health advocate."
However, Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), the committee's ranking member, said he voted against Oz, explaining that the nominee "was given the chance to assure the American people that he would not be a rubber stamp for Republicans' plans to gut Medicaid" and raise Affordable Care Act premiums, but "at every turn, he failed the test."
"No senator should be fooled by the snake oil Oz is selling."
Wyden said he is "deeply concerned about Dr. Oz's history marketing Medicare Advantage plans," which, as frequent Common Dreams opinion contributor Thom Hartmann explained, are not part of Medicare but are a private health insurance "scam" created by a Republican-controlled Congress and signed into law by then-President George W. Bush "as a way of routing hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars into the pockets of for-profit insurance companies.
Wyden added, "Given Dr. Oz's history of basically acting as a salesman for Medicare Advantage, putting him in charge of regulating these middlemen would be like letting the fox guard the henhouse."
Last December, the watchdog Accountable.US revealed that Oz had invested as much as $56 million in three companies with wdirect CMS interests. In 2022, Oz's single biggest healthcare holding was up to $26 million in Sharecare, a digital health company he co-founded, and which became the exclusive in-home supplemental care program for 1.5 million Medicare Advantage customers. Nick Clemens, Oz's spokesperson on the Trump transition team, told USA TODAY last December that Oz sold his stake in Sharecare.
These and other apparent conflicts of interest prompted denunciations from progressive groups and Democratic lawmakers including Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), who also called attention to Oz's promotion of "quack treatments and cures in the interest of personal financial gain."
Robert Weissman, co-president of the consumer advocacy group Public Citizen, said Tuesday: "Mehmet Oz is fundamentally unqualified for the position of administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and should never have been nominated for the position based on his conflicts of interest alone. The Senate Finance Committee should have unanimously rejected his confirmation."
Weissman continued:
Under Oz's watch, could strip crucial healthcare services through Medicare, Medicaid, and the Affordable Care Act could be stripped from hundreds of millions of Americans. As he showed in his confirmation hearing, Oz would seek to further privatize Medicare, threatening access to care for tens of millions of Americans. Privatized Medicare Advantage plans deliver inferior care and cost taxpayers nearly $100 billion annually in excess costs.
He also refused to commit to push back on efforts to slash Medicaid, which would harm access to care for millions—especially the poor and vulnerable—just so Trump and [and his adviser Elon] Musk can give tax breaks to their billionaire buddies.
"We need a CMS administrator who believes in the importance of protecting crucial health programs like Medicare and Medicaid hand would put patients ahead of corporate profits," Weissman added. "We can only hope that sanity prevails when Oz comes for a vote before the full Senate. No senator should be fooled by the snake oil Oz is selling."
Tuesday's vote came as congressional Republicans seek to
slash $880 billion from programs overseen by the House Energy and Commerce Committee—which include Medicaid—in order to help pay for Trump's $4.5 trillion tax cut, which experts say would overwhelmingly benefit the ultrawealthy and corporations.
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Rich Republicans on Key Tax Panels Poised to Gain Over $24 Million From Trump Tax Cuts
"The multimillionaire Republicans in charge of these key committees cannot properly represent average Americans' tax and spending interests," said the executive director of Americans for Tax Fairness.
Feb 27, 2025
An analysis published Thursday shows that Republicans on key committees in the House and Senate are poised to reap huge windfalls for themselves and their families if the trillions of dollars in tax breaks they've been tasked with crafting become law.
The Americans for Tax Fairness (ATF) report examines GOP members of the House Ways and Means Committee and the Senate Finance Committee. The group found that the average net worth of the committees' Republican members is close to $15 million.
Over two-thirds of the 26 members of the House Ways and Means Committee are millionaires, according to ATF.
"The wealthiest GOP members could give themselves a roughly $1.8 million annual income tax cut and their families a potential one-time estate tax cut of $22.8 million—a potential total of $24.6 million in tax cuts if they pass legislation to extend the Trump tax bill," ATF's analysis shows.
The number two Republican on the House Ways and Means Committee, Rep. Vern Buchanan of Florida, is worth nearly $250 million, making him one of the richest members of Congress.
If the tax package that Republican lawmakers are assembling is enacted, Buchanan's family stands to save $5.6 million in taxes thanks to an extension of the 2017 law's estate tax exemptions. Buchanan would personally receive $1.3 million in annual income tax breaks under an extension of the 2017 measure.
Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), who helped secure a major tax gift for the wealthy in the 2017 law, and his family would also benefit to the tune of nearly $6 million from estate tax provisions and other giveaways.
"The multimillionaire Republicans in charge of these key committees cannot properly represent average Americans' tax and spending interests," David Kass, ATF's executive director, said in a statement Thursday. "Their prioritization of extending Trump's tax scam demonstrates their disconnect from middle and working-class constituents' needs."
"While wealthy Democrats also serve on these committees, they aren't promoting continuing the entire Trump tax legislation which primarily benefits rich individuals like them and giant corporations—legislation that would add trillions to the deficit and threaten funding for Social Security, healthcare, education, housing, and other vital public services," Kass added. "A system where millionaires vote for tax benefits favoring other wealthy elites undermines both our economy and democracy."
Under a resolution that House Republicans approved earlier this week, the House Ways and Means Committee is instructed to "submit changes in laws within its jurisdiction that increase the deficit by not more than" $4.5 trillion over the next decade—which would clear the way for an extension of the 2017 tax law that President Donald Trump signed during his first term.
The resolution also instructs the committees that oversee Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program to enact more than $1 trillion in cuts to partially offset the massive cost of the tax giveaways, which would primarily benefit the rich.
According to the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP), "the richest 1% would receive an average tax cut of more than $78,000 in 2026 alone, far outstripping tax cuts to taxpayers in any other income group."
"More than two-thirds of the benefits of these changes would go to the richest fifth of Americans, with 21% of the benefits flowing to the richest 1% alone," Steve Wamhoff, ITEP's federal policy director, wrote in a blog post on Wednesday. "Meanwhile, the middle fifth (20%) of Americans would get just 10% of the benefits and the poorest fifth of Americans would receive 1%."
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Musk's DOGE Blitzkrieg Should Infuriate the Nation
The billionaire oligarch and his henchmen are wreaking havoc in government offices with sensitive personal data of all U.S. citizens. If left unchecked, this is just the beginning of their assault on our democratic system.
Feb 03, 2025
In raids reminiscent of the “January 6” Proud Boys attack on the U.S. Capitol four years ago, unelected, unvetted, and without federal government security clearance, the Trump-anointed head of the yet unapproved Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) Elon Musk and his henchmen are wreaking havoc in government offices with sensitive personal data of all U.S. citizens.
Last week, Musk’s blitzkrieg team gained access to sensitive Treasury data including the Social Security and Medicare customer payment system. Access to the system is closely held because it includes sensitive personal information about the millions of U.S. citizens who receive Social Security checks, tax refunds, and other payments from the federal government.
The responsibility for ensuring payments are accurate is on individual agencies, not the relatively small staff of civil servants at the Treasury Department’s Office of Fiscal Services, which is responsible for making more than one billion payments per year. The office disbursed more than $5 trillion in fiscal year 2023.
Career Department of Treasury Senior Official Forced Out of Job of Ensuring Massive Data Security
After receiving the demand from Musk and his DOGE operatives for access to the extremely sensitive data the Department of Treasury’s on Friday acting Deputy Secretary David Lebryk resigned from his position at Treasury after more than 30 years of service.
The previous weekend, Lebryk had been pushed by Tom Krause—the chief executive of a Silicon Valley company, Cloud Software Group and a member of Musk’s blitzkrieg team—for entry into the federal payments system. Lebryk refused and then was subsequently put on administrative leave and then forced to resign.
In response to Lebryk’s resignation, Musk responded on February 1 to a post on his social media platform X: “The @DOGE team discovered, among other things, that payment approval officers at Treasury were instructed always to approve payments, even to known fraudulent or terrorist groups. They literally never denied a payment in their entire career. Not even once.”
In Musk and Trump styles, Musk provided NO evidence for his allegation.
Senator Ron Wyden Pushes Back on Musk’s Politically Motivated Access to Highly Sensitive Financial Programs and Data
Also on Friday, after hearing about the DOGE raid on the Office of Financial Services, Senator Ron Wyden, the highest-ranking Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, sent a letter to Trump’s Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent outraged that “officials associated with Musk may have intended to access these payment systems to illegally withhold payments to any number of programs. To put it bluntly, these payment systems simply cannot fail, and any politically motivated meddling in them risks severe damage to our country and the economy.”
Sen. Wyden pushed back against DOGE operatives, saying “I can think of no good reason why political operators who have demonstrated a blatant disregard for the law would need access to these sensitive, mission-critical systems.”
Writing on social media on Saturday, Wyden said that “sources tell my office that Treasury Secretary Bessent has granted DOGE *full* access to this system, Social Security and Medicare benefits, grants, payments to government contractors, including those that compete directly with Musk's own companies. All of it."
In a four-page letter dated January 31, 2025, Wyden demanded answers from Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent following a report that personnel affiliated with Musk sought access to the highly sensitive Treasury Department payment system. That system, which is maintained by non-political staff, disperses trillions of dollars each year, such as Social Security and Medicare benefits, tax credits for individuals and businesses, grants and payments to government contractors, including those that compete directly with Musk-owned companies.
Senator Wyden wrote to Trump’s new Secretary of the Treasury:
“I write regarding disturbing reports that officials associated with Elon Musk and the so called U.S. Department of Government Efficiency (“DOGE”) attempted to gain access to systems that control payments to millions of American citizens, including Social Security, Medicare and tax refunds. A confrontation over access apparently resulted in the abrupt resignation of David Lebryk, a career non-partisan Treasury official who recently had been named acting Secretary of the Treasury by President Trump.
These reports are particularly concerning given incidents earlier this week in which Medicaid portals in all 50 states were shut down along with other crucial payment programs, following the Trump Administration illegally issuing an order to freeze all grant and loan payments.
As you are aware, the Bureau of the Fiscal Service’s payment systems control the flow of more than $6 trillion in annual payments to households, businesses and other entities nationwide. These payment systems process more than a billion payments annually and are responsible for the distribution of Social Security and Medicare benefits, tax refunds, payments to federal employees and contractors, including competitors of Musk-owned companies, and thousands of other functions.
To put it bluntly, these payment systems simply cannot fail, and any politically-motivated meddling in them risks severe damage to our country and the economy.
I am deeply concerned that following the federal grant and loan freeze earlier this week, these officials associated with Musk may have intended to access these payment systems to illegally withhold payments to any number of programs.
I can think of no good reason why political operators who have demonstrated a blatant disregard for the law would need access to these sensitive, mission critical systems.
Whether intentional or unintentional, failure of these payment systems could stop Social Security checks from being sent to retirees who need to pay bills and buy food and drugs. It could stop paychecks from being sent to our troops and their families. As you well know, Americans are in the middle of tax filing season, with many counting on tax refunds that they are legally owed by the government.
Most importantly, the federal government is in a financially precarious position, currently utilizing accounting maneuvers to continue paying its bills since it reached the debt limit at the beginning of the year. I am concerned that mismanagement of these payment systems could threaten the full faith and credit of the United States.
Accordingly, I am deeply concerned by the possibility that Elon Musk and a cadre of other unknown DOGE personnel are seeking to gain access to and potentially control the Fiscal Service’s payment systems in order to carry out a political agenda that clearly involves violating the law. It appears that Musk’s behavior is forcing out highly qualified and experienced career public servants in order to get his way and fulfill Trump’s goal of eviscerating the federal budget, including potentially by cutting social security and Medicare benefits for millions of Americans who are already struggling to pay their bills or buy groceries.
The press has previously reported that Musk was denied a high-level clearance to access the government’s most sensitive secrets. I am concerned that Musk’s enormous business operation in China -- a country whose intelligence agencies have stolen vast amounts of sensitive data about Americans, including U.S. government employee data by hacking U.S. government systems—endangers U.S. cybersecurity and creates conflicts of interest that make his access to these systems a national security risk.
Musk now has access to data of all U.S. government employees with no oversight for cybersecurity issues Musk can cause.
DOGE operatives gained access to this Treasury payment system on Friday, the same day that an official at the Office of Personnel Management revealed that Musk operatives had locked career civil servants out of a computer system containing the personal information of federal employees. The action of this group of DOGE operatives, including Musk, is part of the Trump administration's efforts to assert authoritarian control over the federal government.
An Office of Personnel Management (OPM) official told Reuters that "we have no visibility" into what Musk aides "are doing with the computer and data systems," and "that is creating great concern. There is no oversight and it creates real cybersecurity and hacking implications."
Earlier this week, Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-Va.), the ranking member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, warned that Trump "is trying every trick he and his Project 2025 cronies can think of to circumvent established civil service protections so they can purge the civil service of experts and replace them with political loyalists."
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Should Federal Minimum Wage Be Raised Above $7.25? Trump's Treasury Pick: 'No Sir'
"Trump and his billionaire Cabinet have their priorities backwards. Instead of focusing on lower costs and higher wages, they're only trying to line their own pockets while breaking promises to working families," said one critic.
Jan 16, 2025
Scott Bessent, a hedge fund manager and U.S. President-elect Donald Trump's pick for treasury secretary, indicated during his confirmation hearing before the Senate Finance Committee Thursday that he has no issue with the federal minimum wage remaining at $7.25 an hour, the wage floor that's been in place since 2009.
The admission was prompted by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), who asked Bessent, "Will you work with those of us who want to raise the federal minimum wage to a living wage to take millions of Americans out of poverty?"
Bessent replied, "Senator, I believe that the minimum wage is more of a statewide and regional issue."
Sanders then pressed him, asking, "So you don't think we should change the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour?"
"No, sir," said Bessent, who owns assets worth at least $500 million, according to The Washington Post.
The annual wages of a worker making federal minimum wage is $15,080.
In response to these comments, Alex Floyd, the rapid response director at the Democratic National Committee, said in a statement: "Donald Trump and Scott Bessent will give tax handouts to billionaires but oppose raising wages for the poorest Americans. Trump and his billionaire Cabinet have their priorities backwards. Instead of focusing on lower costs and higher wages, they're only trying to line their own pockets while breaking promises to working families."
Bessent has laid out an economic plan known as "3-3-3," which involves reducing the federal budget deficit down to 3% of gross domestic product, getting real GDP growth to 3%, and producing an additional 3 million barrels of oil a day by 2028. The progressive policy institute the Center for American Progress reports that Bessent's 3-3-3 goal would likely require massive cuts of anti-poverty programs and middle-class tax increases to be achieved, taking into account other priorities Bessent has identified, such as his commitment to extend Trump's 2017 tax cuts that benefited high-income households.
In a statement published Thursday, the government watchdog Accountable.US denounced Bessent's defense of Trump's tax cuts—under which "the top 1% saw benefits nearly three times larger than families in the bottom 60%"—and of the president-elect's proposed tariffs, which economists warn could boost inflation.
"Scott Bessent's nomination isn't about helping American families," said the group. "It's about lining the pockets of the ultrawealthy and doubling down on policies that hurt the middle class."
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Leading Senate Democrat Calls JD Vance 'A Phony' on Child Tax Credit
"If JD Vance sincerely gave a whit about working families in America, he would have shown up in the Senate a week and a half ago and voted for my proposal to expand the Child Tax Credit," said Sen. Ron Wyden.
Aug 12, 2024
The Democratic chair of the Senate Finance Committee on Sunday called Sen. JD Vance "a phony" after the Republican vice presidential candidate proposed more than doubling the Child Tax Credit—less than two weeks after skipping a vote on legislation that would have expanded the benefit.
"If JD Vance sincerely gave a whit about working families in America, he would have shown up in the Senate a week and a half ago and voted for my proposal to expand the Child Tax Credit and help 16 million low-income kids get ahead," said Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), who helped craft the compromise bill that passed the House in February but failed to overcome a GOP filibuster in the Senate earlier this month.
Some members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, including Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) in the upper chamber, voted against the measure because—in addition to boosting the Child Tax Credit (CTC)—it would have extended significant corporate tax breaks, a trade-off aimed at securing Republican votes.
Vance (R-Ohio), a self-proclaimed "pro-family" lawmaker, missed the vote because he was visiting the U.S.-Mexico border. Wyden said Sunday that former President Donald Trump's running mate "didn't even care enough to use his platform to call on his Senate Republican colleagues to support" an expansion of the CTC.
"What kept him away while we were voting? He was busy posing for photos on the southern border—another issue he and Donald Trump pretend to care about while they block real solutions for political gain," said Wyden. "Bottom line, the guy's a phony."
In an interview aired Sunday, Vance told CBS' "Face the Nation" that he supports more than doubling the CTC and eliminating the regressive phase-in that leaves the poorest families ineligible for the program.
Such changes would resemble those enacted in 2021 under the American Rescue Plan (ARP), Democratic legislation that GOP lawmakers unanimously opposed. The measure passed before Vance was elected to the U.S. Senate.
The ARP's expansion of the CTC lapsed at the end of 2021 due to opposition from Republicans and Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia, quickly erasing the brief reduction in child poverty that followed the law's passage.
Earlier this month, Vance falsely claimed that Vice President Kamala Harris—the Democratic presidential nominee—"is calling for an end to the Child Tax Credit." Harris cast the tie-breaking vote that allowed the ARP to advance in the Senate.
Bloomberg noted that Vance "went on three network political talk shows Sunday after a shaky start on the GOP ticket, damaged in part by resurfaced comments in which he belittled Democrats, including Vice President Kamala Harris, as 'childless cat ladies.'"
Harris' campaign has hit back forcefully. Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, Harris' running mate, slammed Vance for skipping the CTC expansion vote in a recent social media post.
"In Minnesota, we're cutting poverty and strengthening families with our Child Tax Credit," Walz wrote, referring to a state program that's been described as the most generous in the nation. "You'd think JD Vance would be eager to do the same nationally. Except he skipped a vote to pass the federal Child Tax Credit expansion yesterday. Give me a break with that pro-family talk."
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Dems Slam Social Security Board Nominee Over History of Supporting Benefit Cuts
Sen. Elizabeth Warren said she doesn't "understand why we are being asked to confirm someone whose plan for strengthening Social Security is to gut its protection."
Jan 31, 2024
Democrats on the U.S. Senate Finance Committee raised alarm Wednesday over the nomination of American Enterprise Institute senior fellow Andrew Biggs to serve on the Social Security Advisory Board, pointing to his long record of supporting privatization efforts and benefit cuts.
President Joe Biden first nominated Biggs to the independent board in 2022 and renominated him early last year following the end of the 117th Congress. By nominating Biggs, a conservative, to the post, Biden adhered to the board's tradition of bipartisanship.
But during the finance committee's confirmation hearing for Biggs and other nominees, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) said that she doesn't "understand why we are being asked to confirm someone whose plan for strengthening Social Security is to gut its protection" to a spot on the Social Security Advisory Board (SSAB), which advises lawmakers, the president, the Social Security commissioner on how to bolster the New Deal program.
"In all fairness to Mr. Biggs, his views are not extreme outliers," Warren added. "His plan is Republicans' plan. Republican policymakers have spent years trying to undermine Social Security by pushing to reduce benefits, to raise the retirement age, and to cut payroll taxes that keep the program alive."
Warren pressed Biggs on whether he supports raising taxes on the wealthy to ensure Social Security's solvency over the long term, as Democratic lawmakers have proposed. In 2023, millionaires stopped paying into Social Security just two months into the year thanks to a cap on the amount of income subject to the program's payroll tax.
Biggs said he would "prefer not to" lift the payroll tax cap.
"So you oppose it, OK," Warren responded. "Raising the payroll tax income cap so that the wealthiest Americans pay their fair share would extend Social Security's solvency by 75 years. But if you take raising revenue from the wealthiest people off the table, then that leaves one option to extend Social Security's solvency, and that is benefit cuts."
Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) pointed to Biggs' tenure on a George W. Bush administration commission that suggested partially privatizing Social Security by allowing workers to move a portion of their payroll tax contributions into private accounts, a change that would have compromised the program's primary funding source.
"I'm concerned about your record on Social Security, as you know," Brown said Wednesday, adding that Biggs and his allies support letting "Wall Street gamble with people's guaranteed retirement security."
"You advocated privatizing Social Security," said Brown. "You and your allies back off that sometimes, saying you're not—but you have been."
Biggs told Brown that he does not support privatizing Social Security, breaking with his previous view. Biggs also said that his proposed frameworks for Social Security reform have not included raising the retirement age—but acknowledged he has said in the past that it's not an "unreasonable idea."
During a Senate Finance Committee subcommittee hearing in 2013, Biggs said the "idea that we can't have a higher retirement age I think it just flies in the face of the fact that people did, in fact, retire later in the past, and today's jobs are less physically demanding than they were in the past."
Wednesday's hearing came two weeks after the Republican-controlled House Budget Committee voted largely along party lines to advance legislation to create a fiscal commission for the nation's trust fund programs. Opponents of the bill say it's a ploy to fast-track cuts to Social Security and Medicare.
Social Security Works, a progressive advocacy group, warned Wednesday that "if confirmed to the SSAB, Andrew Biggs would influence policymakers to push for Social Security cuts."
"This would devastate working class families, while creating another way for billionaires to avoid paying their fair share into the system," the group wrote on social media.
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'Serious Ethics Issue': Wealthy Friend Forgave Up to $267K of Luxury RV Loan for Clarence Thomas
The Senate Finance Committee chair said he "should inform the committee exactly how much debt was forgiven and whether he properly reported the loan forgiveness on his tax returns and paid all taxes owed."
Oct 26, 2023
The U.S. Senate Finance Committee on Wednesday released a report detailing how embattled Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas may have had a substantial amount of a loan for a luxury RV forgiven by a wealthy friend—which one watchdog
called "a serious ethics issue."
The panel's probe was sparked by New York Times reporting from August about Anthony Welters loaning Thomas money to buy a used Prevost Le Mirage XL Marathon, or "the Rolls-Royce of motor coaches," which cost $267,230 in 1999. Welters told the newspaper that "the loan was satisfied" and provided a photograph of the title with his signature and a handwritten "lien release" date of November 22, 2008.
The Senate memorandum states that "while additional documents pertaining to the loan agreement may exist, documents reviewed by Democratic staff suggest that Justice Thomas did not repay a significant portion of the loan principal. In fact, none of the documents reviewed by committee staff indicated that Thomas ever made payments to Welters in excess of the annual interest on the loan."
Senate Finance Committee Chair Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) said in a statement that "the committee has the answer to one of the pressing questions raised by reporting about his arrangement with Justice Thomas—was the loan ever repaid? Now we know that Justice Thomas had up to $267,230 in debt forgiven and never reported it on his ethics forms."
Wyden noted some of the "damning" details his staff uncovered in social media posts:
"Regular Americans don't get wealthy friends to forgive huge amounts of debt so they can buy a second home," the senator stressed. "Justice Thomas should inform the committee exactly how much debt was forgiven and whether he properly reported the loan forgiveness on his tax returns and paid all taxes owed."
As the Times reported Wednesday:
A lawyer for Justice Thomas, Elliot S. Berke, disputed the committee's findings, saying, "The loan was never forgiven." He added, "The Thomases made all payments to Mr. Welters on a regular basis until the terms of the agreement were satisfied in full."
But he did not to respond when the Times asked him to reconcile that statement with documents obtained by the committee and cited in its report, including a 2008 letter from Mr. Welters to Justice Thomas stating that he would not seek further payments on the loan despite being entitled to them. Nor would Mr. Berke say whether "satisfied" meant that the justice had fully repaid the $267,230 he borrowed plus interest.
Wyden also said Wednesday that he "directed the committee to share our findings with the Judiciary Committee to evaluate the ethics implications of this disclosure."
In response to the findings, More Perfect Union's Jordan Zakarin asked Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) on social media: "Do you have any interest in investigating? Or are you just going to let these maniac right-wing billionaires buy the Supreme Court and trash what remains of democracy?"
Durbin said that "with each new report, the American people realize how many lavish, undisclosed gifts Justice Thomas has received from his gaggle of fawning billionaires."
Thomas has also come under fire recently for his relationships with the
Koch network, fellow members of the Horatio Alger Association of Distinguished Americans, and billionaire real estate developer Harlan Crow, who treated Thomas to luxury vacations, bought his mother's house, and contributed to the private school tuition for a great-nephew the right-wing justice raised.
"This latest example—an undisclosed, forgiven $250,000+ loan—further proves the need for a binding code of conduct for all Supreme Court justices," Durbin added, pledging to take the report into account as his panel presses forward with ethics reform. He also has a message for Chief John Roberts: "Just How many more bombshell reports need to drop before you act on ethics reform? Until you act, we will."
Senate Judiciary Committee Democrats advanced Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse's (D-R.I.) Supreme Court Ethics, Recusal, and Transparency (SCERT) Act in July, but the bill is unlikely to be passed by the full chamber or the GOP-controlled House.
Ethics concerns related to Thomas and other justices have fueled demands this year for reform legislation—including to expand the court—as well as recusals from specific cases and even Thomas' resignation.
Congressman Bill Pascrell (D-N.J.) said in response to the Senate's RV report that "Thomas takes cash while crushing your freedoms. He's corrupt as hell and should resign today."
Others highlighted that Thomas in June voted to strike down President Joe Biden's student debt relief plan, which would have canceled up to $20,000 per federal borrower.
"Clarence Thomas got a rich buddy to #cancelcamperdebt," Mike Pierce of the Student Borrower Protection Center wrote on social media. "That sound you hear is the collective primal scream coming from 40 million people who just want the Corrupt Clarence deal."
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'Nothing Off the Table': Wyden Says Subpoena Possible for Billionaire Harlan Crow
"It comes as little surprise that Mr. Crow is doubling down on bogus legal theories as he continues to stonewall basic questions about his gifts to Clarence Thomas and his family."
Jun 06, 2023
U.S. Senate Finance Committee Chair Ron Wyden on Tuesday said that "nothing is off the table"—including a subpoena—after a lawyer for Republican mega-donor Harlan Crow continued to duck questions about the billionaire's gifts to Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and his relatives.
In a June 2 letter to Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), Crow attorney Michael Bopp expressed "respect" for the panel's "important role in formulating legislation concerning our federal courts system," while stating that he would "welcome a discussion with your staff."
However, Bopp also reiterated his assertion that "Congress does not have the power to impose ethics standards on the Supreme Court" and "therefore cannot mount an investigation for the purpose of helping craft such standards."
"It comes as little surprise that Mr. Crow is doubling down on bogus legal theories as he continues to stonewall basic questions about his gifts to Clarence Thomas and his family."
Thomas and Crow have repeatedly refused to answer questions about years of gifts—including luxury vacations and private school tuition—to the right-wing justice and members of his family.
In response to Bopp's assertion—which has been roundly refuted by Durbin and legal experts—Wyden, a progressive Oregon Democrat, accused the Gibson Dunn partner of "stonewalling."
"It comes as little surprise that Mr. Crow is doubling down on bogus legal theories as he continues to stonewall basic questions about his gifts to Clarence Thomas and his family. If anything, the most recent letter from his attorney raises more questions than it answers," the senator said in a statement.
"The letter states, 'charter rates or reimbursements at rates prescribed by law were paid to the Crow family entities' with zero additional detail that could help clarify these financial arrangements, such as exactly who made those payments for Justice Thomas' extravagant luxury travel, and how many times and in what amounts those payments were made," Wyden continued.
"Far too often, efforts to investigate real-life tax practices of the ultra-wealthy and powerful end with this kind of vague, carefully-worded assurance that everything is on the level. That's simply not good enough," he argued. "This is exactly why the Finance Committee is pursuing this matter as part of its broader review of gift and estate tax practices of ultra-high net worth individuals."
Wyden added: "I've already begun productive discussions with the Finance Committee on next steps to compel answers to our questions from Mr. Crow, including by subpoena, and those discussions will continue."
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