Kansas newspaper begs Kansas senator not to subject America to Kansas' failed tax-slashing experiment

Kansas newspaper urges Sen. Jerry Moran to vote no on tax bill

(Image credit: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

last updated 29 November 2017

After the Senate Budget Committee cleared a massive Republican tax bill Tuesday along party lines, with two wavering Republicans voting in favor, the prospect brightened for the Senate approving the legislation on Thursday or Friday. President Trump and GOP leaders spent the day assuring Republicans worried about adding up to $1.5 trillion to the deficit or seeking larger tax cuts for pass-through businesses that their concerns will be addressed, and those senators appeared mollified. But in an editorial Tuesday night, The Kansas City Star made a last-ditch, experience-based plea to Sen. Jerry Moran (R-Kan.): "Why would you take this failed experiment nationwide?"

Moran "is not just another Republican who has to decide which way to jump on the tax bill," the Star editorial board wrote. "He has already seen, first-hand, during a very painful five years, what will happen if it passes." For those not up to speed, the Star explains:

Every Kansan knows what happened after Gov. Sam Brownback's 2012 cuts did away with the state income tax for some 330,000 business owners. The governor kept insisting — and in fact, still does — that robust growth and woohoo, jobs galore would result. When that didn't happen, elected officials kept having to dip into funds set aside for highways and schools just to balance the budget. Finally, this year, lawmakers overrode a Brownback veto and at last repealed the LLC tax break and raised income tax rates. [The Kansas City Star]

"Senator, we understand that you want to get something accomplished," the Star editors write. "But you don't have the luxury of the ignorance that the president could plausibly claim when just days after his election he went around promising applauding, whistling patrons in one of New York's best restaurants, 'We'll get your taxes down, don't worry about it.'" You can read the entire editorial at The Kansas City Star.

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Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.