Surprise! John Kerry Plans Clinton Style Tax Hikes

Candidate provides further evidence his plan is to impose across the board increases just like those in 1993

WASHINGTON – After campaigning for over a year on a promise to raise taxes on only the "rich,” John Kerry has finally made his plans crystal clear yesterday; he wants to stick middle class Americans with a huge tax hike.

In a speech yesterday, Kerry told his audience that he plans to follow Bill Clinton’s model and do, “the same thing that we set out to do in 1993, and I was there and I voted for it, I know how we did it.” They “did it” with the largest tax increase in American history.

"President Bush fought to give American Taxpayers the relief they needed,” said ATR President Grover Norquist. “John Kerry wants to turn around, destroy those cuts, and slam the American people with a huge Clinton style tax hike.”

John Kerry voted twice in 1993 for Bill Clinton’s tax bill, which the late Democratic Senator Daniel
Patrick Moynihan (D-NY) called the “biggest tax increase in history.” The legislation hit the middle class hard, increasing the marginal tax rates for those making between $30,000 and $100,000 per year and raising taxes on gasoline and social security. Kerry said that he is “proud to have supported and voted for (Clinton\’s) economic plan.”

"John Kerry has repeatedly misled the American People by saying he only wants to raise taxes on the rich,” continued Norquist. “Yesterday’s statement demonstrates Kerry has every intention of implementing an across-the-board tax hike that will sting the middle class and working families nationwide.”

On July 31, 2003, Kerry claimed on MSNBC’s Hardball that "We Democrats…balanced the budget…
without raising taxes on middle class Americans." Kerry’s claim contradicts his 1993 speech on the floor of the Senate, when he said, “I wish that we did not need to raise taxes (on the middle class), but …this budget cannot be balanced without increasing taxes.” Kerry apparently has a problem with telling the truth about both his record on tax increases and his intentions to raise them in the future.