The American Federation of Teachers is urging Democratic candidates to step up their attacks on last year’s Republican-passed tax cuts, armed with voter surveys that find the legislation useful as a way to argue for more public spending.
“We’ve found support for an increase in health-care spending, and for an argument that the increase is going to come from tax cuts for the rich,” said Stan Greenberg, a pollster at Democracy Corps who conducted the voter survey for AFT. “They created the vehicle for expanding investment by passing this tax cut.”
The survey, conducted with 1,000 voter phone interviews and 1,400 online voter interviews, prodded voters with some messages that put pro-tax politics in a favorable light. But it also tested a message that echoes what Republicans have said in ads and speeches all year — that Democrats “say that the average savings of $2,000 per family is crumbs.”
After hearing that message, 27 percent of voters in the Democracy Corps survey were more likely to support Republicans; 37 percent of voters preferred “higher taxes on the richest so we can invest in education and make health care more affordable.”
Democrats never considered softening their message on the tax cut, but Republicans have spent much of the year trying to turn that against them. In the spring, after weeks of stories about some large (and small) employers issuing bonuses to employees, public opinion of the tax law swung from negative to roughly even.
But support for the law ticked down after that, and has remained flat for months, despite several ongoing ad campaigns designed to boost its popularity. In congressional campaigns, Republicans have generally stuck to an argument that a loss of the House of Representatives would lead to higher taxes. Democrats, said AFT President Randi Weingarten, could counterpunch by emphasizing what Republicans like House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) wanted to do next — entitlement changes, with the higher deficits spurred by the tax cut as a pretext.
“The tax cut, from the beginning, was clearly steered to the rich even though Trump and Republicans in Congress tried to message as something other than that,” Weingarten said. “What people are not seeing is reductions in health care and drug costs. All the things Trump promised workers with economic growth, they’re seeing benefits for the rich instead.”
Republicans see the politics very differently. The tax cut, while not popular, has never returned to the polling lows around its passage. Neither have Republicans themselves; the president’s approval rating has returned to the low 40s from the 30s, and Republican numbers in the national generic ballot and in individual House races are higher than they were in December. (They dipped this month, however, after some outlier polls showing a GOP surge spooked Democrats.)
While Republicans now expect to vote on immigration bills next week, party leaders have talked about using the summer for a “phase two” of tax cuts, which would likely consist of making permanent the middle-class income tax cuts in the legislation — currently set to sunset, a compromise made to work inside budget rules.
“They’re not willing to give up on tax cut message, but if they go back to the well again it will weaken them further,” Greenberg said.