In a floor speech earlier this week, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell spoke out against letting top-bracket tax cuts expire. “We can’t let the people who’ve been hit the hardest by this recession, and who need to create the jobs that will get us out of it, foot the bill for the Democrats’ two-year adventure in expanded government,” he said.
His spokesman Don Stewart emailed to say McConnell did not mean to suggest that “the people who’ve been hit the hardest by this recession” are the same upper income people who will “foot the bill” for Democratic policies.
McConnell “doesn’t believe the richest people in American have had the hardest time in this recession,” Stewart says.
Stewart went on: “He does believe that small businesses, their employees and customers have been hit hard over the past two years, leading to higher unemployment which affects millions of Americans across the country. And Sen. McConnell doesn’t believe anyone should be hit with a tax hike—not the lowest income who have borne the brunt of the recession, and not small businesses who will lead the recovery through job growth to get us out of this recession.”
Emphasis ours.
Brian Beutler
Brian Beutler is TPM's senior congressional reporter. Since 2009, he's led coverage of health care reform, Wall Street reform, taxes, the GOP budget, the government shutdown fight, and the debt limit fight. He can be reached at brian@talkingpointsmemo.com.
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