On the recordApril 8, 2014
I am glad the chairman of the committee recognized that there are about $1 trillion worth of tax expenditures. What does that mean? That means tax preferences in the Tax Code. $1 trillion a year, he said. That is right. And yet, the Republican budget doesn't close one penny of those tax expenditures to help reduce our deficit, not one. It says we have to reserve all those tax loophole closures to cut the top rate for millionaires by one-third, from 39 percent to 25 percent. That is what they want to do with all the tax expenditures. Because they refuse to get rid of one of those tax expenditures for the purposes of deficit reduction, their budget does hit all these students. What is honest is to tell students who are going to college right now that this budget is going to charge them over $40 billion more in interest because now they are going to have to pay interest while they are still in college, even though it doesn't close one of those tax expenditures for very wealthy people to help meet the targets and reduce the deficit, not one. So, as we look at the priorities in this budget, we have to ask ourselves, why is it that this Republican budget doesn't call for any shared responsibility? Why is it that it does provide tax breaks to folks at the very top at the expense of the rest of the country? Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time. {time} 1615
