The Seattle city council unanimously passed a measure Monday to increase the income tax on the city’s wealthiest citizens, and the mayor is actually welcoming a lawsuit from those that oppose it.
The legislation institutes a 2.25 percent tax rate on those earning over $250,000 and married couples making over $500,000, Reuters reports. The tax is anticipated to add an additional $140 million in new annual revenue to Seattle.
Under 20,000 Seattle residents will be directly subject to the measure, which is a small percentage of a city with over 660,000 citizens.
The city’s mayor, Ed Murray, promised to sign the measure into law Friday and told a cheering crowd Monday that he be happy to take on any legal challenges against the measure.
“Our goal is to replace our regressive tax system with a new formula for fairness, while ensuring Seattle stands up to President Trump’s austere budget that cuts transportation, affordable housing, healthcare, and social services,” the mayor wrote in an email after the city council passed the measure.
Murray announced in May that he will serve out the rest of his term as mayor, which ends Dec. 31, and he would not seek re-election. The mayor was forced into ending his storied political career after he struggled for months to shake allegations that he paid teenage boys for sex in the 1980s, Washington Post reports.
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