Politics

Fox Host Presses Earnest Over Tax Increase Plan: Congress Won’t Pass It, ‘So What’s The Point?’ [VIDEO]

Al Weaver Reporter
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In an appearance to promote the president’s agenda ahead of the State of the Union address, Fox News’ Bill Hemmer pressed White House spokesman Josh Earnest over the president’s plan to raise taxes on the wealthiest Americans.

After Hemmer told Earnest there is virtually no chance that a tax increase can get through a GOP-controlled Congress, the Fox host asked him “what’s the point” of pushing this.

The White House announced the president’s plan to raise $320 billion in revenue over 10 years by raising capital gains taxes and taxes on those making over $500,000, which has been widely panned by Republicans in Congress.

“You know these tax ideas are not going get through a Republican-led Congress,” Hemmer told Earnest. “So what’s the point?”

“This is an opportunity for the President of the United States at the State of the Union address when he is before the country on live television and before the Congress to lay out his ideas and his vision for how he can move the country forward,” Earnest responded. “If Republicans have a different vision, if there are areas where they can disagree, they are welcome to say so. If they think it’s more important to protect that loophole for people who have trust funds then they can certainly make that case.”

“But you know what the signal has been already, and if everybody wants to move the country forward this is not the idea that’s going to make it work,” Hemmer told Earnest

“I actually think it is an idea that will work. The problem is Republicans are saying they oppose it,” Earnest told the Fox host. “That’s the reason we are not putting in place this idea to move the country forward. This is part of the debate and one we are happy to have.”