[Congressional Record Volume 165, Number 87 (Thursday, May 23, 2019)]
[Senate]
[Page S3082]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                               TAX REFORM

  Mr. BROWN. Mr. President, there was an article in the paper today 
telling us something that surprises nobody in this Chamber, really, on 
either side, surveying the tax packages, the proposals from Democrats 
and Republicans, and making the contrast, and it said the Democratic 
tax packages are significantly better for the middle class than the 
Republican tax package.
  We know what happened 2-plus years ago when the Finance Committee, in 
the middle of the night, kept writing new language and biasing it 
towards the wealthiest people in the county.
  We know that the Trump tax bill, voted for by the majority, opposed 
by all of us because over 75 percent of the benefits, over time, went 
to the richest 1 percent. Contrast that with our Working Families Tax 
Relief Act, which focuses on middle-class and working-class taxpayers, 
focuses on the earned income tax credit and the child tax credit under 
the theory that, if you cut taxes for the rich, which Republicans 
always do, that the money trickles down, but it doesn't trickle down. 
They say it is going to trickle down and help the middle class. Well, 
it really never does.
  I heard President Trump promise a group of us in the White House that 
everybody would get a $4,000 raise and several thousand dollars in tax 
cuts for middle-class families--it just didn't happen.
  The way you grow the economy is you focus on the middle class, you 
cut taxes for the middle class, put money in their pocket, they spend 
it in local communities. You cut taxes for the rich, it goes to a Swiss 
bank account or wherever it goes.
  So the newspaper today said what everybody already knows, that the 
best way to grow the economy, the best way to help this country, the 
best way to help the middle class is--surprise--cut taxes for the 
middle class. That is what the Working Families Tax Relief Act does. It 
helps working class kids.
  The Trump tax bill pretended to cut taxes through the child tax 
credit. For the child tax credit, it actually left 26 million children 
out. Our legislation focuses on those 26 million children. They are not 
children of the rich. They are children of the middle class. They are 
working families. They are low-income kids.
  So it is clear that that is the way this body should go. I understand 
who has the votes. I understand that the President of the United 
States--where the White House looks like a retreat for Wall Street 
executives--the President of the United States can always jam another 
tax cut for billionaires through this body.
  But let's do the right thing and actually put our focus on working 
families.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Maine.

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