[Congressional Record Volume 168, Number 149 (Thursday, September 15, 2022)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4628-S4629]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                    Inflation Reduction Act of 2022

  Mr. THUNE. Madam President, the August inflation numbers came out

[[Page S4629]]

this week, and they weren't good. Inflation was even higher than 
expected. It was very clear that soaring prices are likely to continue 
for quite a while, but as usual, it doesn't seem to concern the 
Democrats one bit.
  The President was asked Tuesday if he was concerned about August's 
even-worse-than-expected inflation report.
  His answer? ``No, I'm not.''
  It was just one more tone-deaf moment for the President and the 
Democrats.
  On Tuesday, the President and the Democrats gathered at the White 
House to congratulate themselves for having passed their so-called 
Inflation Reduction Act, a bill that will do nothing--nothing--to 
reduce inflation. That is not just my opinion. That was the conclusion 
of the nonpartisan Penn Wharton Budget Model and of the Democrat 
chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, who referred to the bill as 
the ``so-called Inflation Reduction Act'' on the Senate floor while 
admitting it would do nothing to solve our Nation's inflation crisis.
  But that didn't stop the Democrats from celebrating yesterday. For 
most of us, of course, it is difficult to understand what there was to 
celebrate. Leaving aside the issue of the 40-year-high inflation, we 
already know that the bill will also fall short in another respect--on 
deficit reduction.
  The Democrats' claims that the bill would provide meaningful deficit 
reduction were always somewhat dubious, but even granting the 
Democrats' rosiest assumptions, President Biden wiped out any deficit 
reduction when he announced his massive student loan giveaway 8 days--8 
days--after the Inflation Reduction Act was signed into law.
  So no inflation reduction, no deficit reduction. Oh, one other thing: 
The Inflation Reduction Act will drive up energy bills for Americans.
  So the question is: What was there to celebrate?
  Well, for the Democrats, the Inflation Reduction Act marked a chance 
to finally push through some of their far-left, Green New Deal 
fantasies, things like electric vehicle tax credits to help wealthy 
Americans buy electric cars, more than $60 billion--$60 billion--for 
``environmental justice priorities,'' including $1.9 billion for things 
like identifying gaps in tree canopy coverage, and the list goes on. So 
I think the Democrats are pretty satisfied with themselves over finally 
jamming through elements of their Green New Deal agenda.
  Then, of course, they succeeded in extending increased ObamaCare 
subsidies that will push Americans off of private healthcare plans and 
into government-run care.
  Then--then--there are the tax hikes. The current Democratic leader 
once said, ``You don't want to take money out of the economy when the 
economy is shrinking,'' like it has in the previous two quarters. But 
those days are gone. For the Democrats, raising taxes has become an 
article of faith.
  And it goes far beyond raising money to help pay for their Big 
Government spending. The Democrats believe raising taxes on 
corporations and well-off Americans is good in and of itself, even if 
those tax hikes have a negative effect on less well-off Americans and 
the economy. The tax hikes that the Democrats have included in their 
so-called Inflation Reduction Act will, indeed, have a negative effect 
on our economy and on the hard-working Americans who help support it. 
The Democrats' tax hikes on businesses will result in slower growth, 
lower wages, and thousands of fewer jobs, and the Democrats' tax hikes 
on conventional energy will result in higher energy prices for working 
families.
  In addition to raising taxes, the other main way the Inflation 
Reduction Act raises revenue is by increasing IRS audits and placing 
new burdens on taxpayers.
  The Democrats' bill contains a whopping $80 billion in increased 
funding for the IRS. That is an increase in funding which represents 
six times the annual budget of the IRS today. More than half of those 
funds, or $46 billion, are earmarked for increased IRS enforcement. 
Just 4 percent is for improving customer service, which should tell you 
all you need to know about where the Democrats' real priorities lie.
  The bill would provide for the hiring of as many as 87,000 new 
employees, which would more than double the current size of the Agency 
and make the IRS--make the IRS, if you can believe this--larger than 
Customs and Border Protection and the U.S. Coast Guard put together, 
combined.
  In the lead-up to the passage of the Democrats' bill, the Biden 
administration put out a statement declaring that the money for IRS 
enforcement would not go to the increased audits of households making 
less than $400,000. Because we had reason to doubt that that would be 
the case, the Republicans put forward an amendment to the bill to 
prevent the IRS from using its new money to audit those Americans. 
Every Democrat--every single Democrat--voted against the amendment. So, 
I guess, the Democrats are happy to oppose more IRS audits of middle-
class Americans in theory, but they don't want to cut off the 
possibility of those audits in practice if they end up needing them to 
help fund their Green New Deal spending.
  I don't need to tell anyone that the IRS is notorious for mishandling 
sensitive taxpayer data. As recently as this month, we learned that the 
IRS had inadvertently posted confidential taxpayer data of around 
120,000 individuals on its website--private taxpayer information that 
was available to the general public.
  Then, of course, there was last year's leak, or hack, of confidential 
taxpayer information that was shared with the left-leaning ProPublica 
and was used to advance a partisan agenda for which, I might add, 
neither the IRS nor the Biden administration has provided any 
accountability.
  Then there was the infamous targeting of conservative groups for 
extra scrutiny under the Obama IRS, and the list goes on.
  I haven't even discussed the IRS's record of grossly 
underperforming--some would say nonexistent--customer service. During 
the 2022 tax season, just 10 percent of taxpayers' calls--10 percent of 
taxpayers' calls--to the IRS were answered by an IRS employee. What we 
need to be doing is holding the IRS accountable, not setting tens of 
thousands of new IRS agents loose on taxpayers' accounts.
  Earlier this week, I joined my Republican colleagues on the Senate 
Finance Committee to introduce legislation to prevent the IRS from 
using its new funding to audit American workers or small business 
owners earning less than $400,000 per year.
  I also introduced a bill this week, along with Senator Collins, to 
improve taxpayer service at the IRS. Our legislation, called the 
Increase Reliable Services Now Act, would prevent the IRS from hiring 
new employees for enforcement until customer service at the IRS had 
reached a more acceptable level. It is unacceptable--unacceptable--that 
taxpayers have a 1 in 10 chance of receiving assistance when calling 
the IRS, and the Agency should not be allowed to increase enforcement 
hires until it has achieved at least a basic level of customer service.
  So we have 87,000 new employees, which is double--double--the size of 
the current IRS workforce, and we have $80 billion, which is six times 
the current annual budget of the IRS, with a specific focus: going 
after taxpayers in this country to try and get, raise--whatever--more 
revenue to fund the Democrats' Big Government fantasies. At the same 
time, 1 in 10 taxpayers is getting his calls returned at the IRS.
  I will continue to work to increase IRS accountability and prevent 
hard-working Americans from being squeezed to fund Democrats' Green New 
Deal spending.
  Like the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan spending spree that came 
before it--which, I would add, helped plunge our country into our 
current inflation crisis--the Inflation Reduction Act is a bad deal for 
the American people, and all of the self-congratulatory White House 
parties in the world aren't going to change that basic fundamental 
fact.
  Americans are experiencing serious economic hardship, and Democrats 
are doing nothing to help.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Markey). The Senator from Iowa.