Last Thursday, in the Congressional race for New York’s 23rd district, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) released an aggressive attack ad on Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman.
This advertisement made the claim that Doug Hoffman wishes to send American jobs overseas. Their only source for this that they provided was the fact that Doug Hoffman had signed the Taxpayer Protection Pledge (see graphic). As such, the DCCC is claiming that that the Pledge endorses the sending of jobs overseas.
This scurrilous smear is factually incorrect.
The Taxpayer Protection Pledge is a vow that if elected, a candidate will oppose any and all efforts to raise federal income taxes. 172 Congressmen, 34 Senators, and over 1,100 state legislators from all parties have signed the Pledge and demonstrated their commitment to the taxpayer.
In these economic times, ensuring our businesses remain competitive is critical. Rather than destroying jobs, international tax relief is good for all working American families. For every worker employed by a U.S. subsidiary in a foreign country, 2.3 Americans are employed in the U.S. But the United States has the highest federal corporate tax rate in the world. This is almost 15 percentage points higher than the OECD average, and more than double the rate of high-growth economies like Switzerland and Ireland. And, to make matters worse, American companies are among the few in the world liable to be taxed twice. At the end of the day, companies don’t pay these double taxes – people do. The only way to help working families anywhere is to ensure our businesses are competitive on the world stage.
By signing the ATR Taxpayer Protection Pledge, candidates are demonstrating their commitment to the taxpayers in their district that they support job creation. For the DCCC to suggest otherwise is dishonest, deceitful, and quite simply deranged.