Cory Booker’s New Tax Idea Alarms Some Progressives

Democratic senators are pitching massive tax cuts as a way to counter Donald Trump’s populist appeal.

WASHINGTON — Two new plans from potential Democratic presidential candidates to exempt lower-income people from paying taxes are being met with intense derision from the party’s policy experts, arguing the ideas from Sens. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) and Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) are poorly structured and will work against progressive goals in the long term.

Booker’s proposal, unveiled Monday, would exempt from taxation the $37,500 a single person earns yearly, or $75,000 for a married couple filing jointly. Van Hollen rolled out a plan last week to eliminate income taxes for individuals making less than $46,000 or married couples making less than $92,000.

Both proposals come at the start of intra-party jockeying over what Democrats’ agenda should be if they manage to take power in 2028, with the party trying to balance the desires of an increasingly cynical electorate, its long-standing commitments to protecting and expanding the social safety net, recovering from the damage President Donald Trump has done to the country’s long-term fiscal health and the hope its policies will actually work long term.

“The Democratic Party is confused about what it wants,” Bobby Kogan, director of federal budget policy at the Center for American Progress, told HuffPost.

Will Raderman, a senior policy adviser at the Searchlight Institute, a liberal think tank dedicated to outside-the-box policy thinking, questioned whether the anti-tax messaging at the center of Booker and Van Hollen’s proposals is the best way for Democrats to show solidarity with working people.