Democrats trying to push for middle-class tax cuts extension

Democrats trying to push for middle-class tax cuts extension

Middle-class tax cuts will be tried to be extended by Democrats in Congress through a series of votes. The lawmakers, who met with President Barack Obama on Thursday at the White House, also plans to allow tax cuts for affluent Americans to expire. The move by Obama’s party mates is likely to be curtailed by Republicans opposed to any kind of extension of the said tax cuts. A deadlock may result from the competing agenda of both parties ahead of a tax hike that is scheduled to be implemented this January.

During the meeting, the Democrats said that the President did not recommend a specific strategy on how to push for the tax cuts and instead would prefer to wait for the outcome of a meeting between the two parties’ leaders at the end of the month to discuss the issue.

"I think there's a reality here which is that while it might be best to continue the middle-class tax cuts and raise taxes on higher income people, the votes are not there to do that," said independent lawmaker Sen. Joseph Lieberman. "I think everybody's got to deal with a stark reality which is, are we going to leave here knowing that we haven't come to an agreement and that everybody's taxes are going to go up Jan. 1?"

A vote on a bill to make permanent all tax cuts sponsored by Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell is up for a possible vote. Another proposal by the Democrats is to extend the tax cuts for middle-class Americans only. Both measures are likely to fail because of Republican opposition. Nancy Pelosi, the Speaker of the House, said she might put forth a vote for an extension of middle-class tax cuts next month.

Posted by James Fried on Friday November 19 2010, 5:45 AM EST. Ref: AP. All trademarks acknowledged. Filed under Featured News, Finance. Comments and Trackbacks closed. Follow responses: RSS 2.0