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WASHINGTON – Congressman Paul Tonko (NY-20) harshly criticized today’s vote by House Republicans to use deficit spending and middle class tax hikes to give tax handouts to rich families and wealthy corporations. The bill, H.R. 1, was just adopted by a vote of 227 to 205:

“Congressional Republicans took another step forward today in their plan to raise taxes on millions of middle class families, rip away their healthcare and explode the deficit, and give massive tax handouts to some of the wealthiest individuals and corporations in the world. Their vote today betrays millions of working families in New York and all across the country.

“Fifty percent of the benefits of this bill go directly to the wealthiest one percent. 36 million Americans will face higher taxes under this plan, many of them in my home state of New York. This bill hurts teachers, students, veterans, people with cancer and Alzheimer’s and anyone with a job that can be moved overseas. Republican leaders knew they would need to rush that kind of bad news through the House before the American people could find out what they were up to. That’s exactly what they did with today’s vote.

“I want to be clear: this fight is not over. The phones in my Washington office starting ringing off the hook today, just as they did each time Republicans tried to gut the American healthcare system earlier this year. Phone lines, social media pages and mailboxes are being flooded with comments from people demanding that Congress stop doing the bidding of the biggest donors and corporate lobbyists and get back to doing the peoples’ work. Those calls, emails, letters and social media posts need to continue.”

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