Letters to the Editor: Just repeal Trump’s $1.7-trillion tax cut — then we can negotiate SALT

To the editor: Jonah Goldberg’s column on the hypocrisy of congressional Democrats trying raise the deduction limit for state and local taxes (SALT) from $10,000 to $80,000 might have pointed out the obvious. However, Goldberg’s claims of hypocrisy fall apart when considering all the relevant facts.

If the increase in SALT deductions in the Build Back Better bill is a gift to the wealthy, it follows that the reduction in the 2017 GOP bill reflects a will to tax the wealthy. This, of course, is backward.

The GOP measure was actually the exact opposite — an offset to generous gifts to the rich to allow for passage under Senate reconciliation rules. In essence, higher-income Democratic states were gouged to allow for a bounty of tax breaks to flow to those Americans least in need.

If, as Goldberg infers, Republicans support the rich paying their fair share, one must wonder why they did not take such action during the 104 years that full deductibility was allowable. The answer is that it was a matter of routine bipartisan agreement up until the point that it had to be repudiated to satisfy rich GOP donors.

The solution to this problem is the most simple: repeal, in full, of the irresponsible 2017 tax bill.

Eric Carey, Arlington, Va.

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To the editor: Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) have proposed a $400,000 cap on income for those who can take the SALT deduction. You can argue that is too high; maybe it should be $150,000. But that’s what negotiations are for.

The former president left a lot of land mines to be sorted out. The $10,000 SALT deduction limit is just one of them, as it hit the middle class in Democratic states on purpose.

I do think it odd that tax credits for electric cars (Democrats own them!) and funding for non-discriminating preschool (it doesn’t pay for our religious indoctrination!) are part of this hypocrisy cry. Let’s just start with repealing the $1.7-trillion tax cut and then go from there.

Laurie Pisano, Rancho Palos Verdes

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To the editor: Thanks to Goldberg for reporting that the Democrats’ Build Back Better bill gives the rich a colossal tax cut.

The Democrats in Congress have shown themselves to be hypocrites and liars — hypocrites because they want to cut taxes for largely wealthier individuals who pay a lot in state and local taxes, and liars because they have combined two separate benefit items so their additional tax cuts for the rich appear to be the second-largest item in their bill.

This is too much. We cannot trust either party to be free of control by the rich and powerful.

Fred Fenton, Seal Beach