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Tarrant Faults Bernie Sanders for Voting Against Bush Tax Cuts and to Stop Cash Balance Plans
In his new television ad, Rich Tarrant accuses Congressman Bernie Sanders of opposing the child tax credit and making it harder to transfer a pension when a worker changes jobs. This is completely untrue. Tarrant cites votes out of context and uses votes against the Bush tax cuts for the super-wealthy as proof Bernie opposes the child tax credit. The truth is that Bernie has voted over a dozen times to expand the child tax credit. Tarrant also cites Bernie's work to protect workers pensions that are threatened when companies switch to cash balance plans. Bernie Sanders is second to no one in the effort to preserve workers' pensions and worked tirelessly and successfully to help out IBM employees who were asked to accept huge cuts in the pensions they were promised.
Child Tax Credit
Bernie Sanders has a strong record of supporting the child tax credit along with lower taxes for working folks and the middle class. In fact, he originally proposed the $300 tax rebate that became law in 2001.
Tarrant's ad states that "Bernie voted to take away part of our child tax credit." To prove this, many of the votes that are cited are votes against the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy. Bernie voted against the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy that have saddled our nation and future generations with a skyrocketing national debt. In fact, on some of the bills in question, Bernie voted to keep the child tax credit while removing many of the provisions that gave tax breaks to the super-rich. Not only that, but Bernie has voted to extend the child tax credit to low income families.
Pensions
Bernie Sanders is a national leader in defending the pensions of tens of thousands of Americans. He protected IBM workers' pensions and is a leader in keeping corporations from switching to pension plans-cash balance plans-that shortchange workers.
In Tarrant's ad, it states that Bernie ".voted to make it harder to transfer our pension if we change jobs." In fact, Bernie voted against a bill that did nothing to address corporations switching to cash balance plans and offered provisions to the bill that would have stopped the implementation of cash balance plans. He voted against the final bill that did not include his provisions. On the House floor he stated he would vote against the bill because ".because in my State and throughout this country, there are huge numbers of workers who were promised benefits when they signed up for the job, and then those benefits were taken away from them in the dead of night when the defined benefits that they had signed on for were converted into cash balance payments."