Governor Evers on Tuesday said that the State is collecting far more taxes than expected, enough that he proposes to cut taxes by 10 percent for what he calls “working families”, restore the Homestead Tax Credit to help seniors on fixed incomes, expand property tax relief for veterans with disabilities, eliminate the minimum markup law on gasoline, cap the copay cost of insulin, and create a Caregiver Tax Credit, as well as expand the Child and Dependent Care Credit. All that would cost $600 million of a projected $3.8 billion revenue surplus. But Senate Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu of Oostburg, along with fellow Republican Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, begs to differ with those proposals.
Responding to the Governor’s announcement, LeMahieu called the proposal the result of an “election-year conversion on taxes”, pointing to Evers’ push to first raise taxes by $1 billion in his budget, and that now wants to cut them as the political winds change. LeMahieu continued that “If the governor is serious about providing financial relief to Wisconsinites, he could fund it immediately using federal ARPA dollars. Instead, he’s using a state taxpayer surplus to create political division.
The Legislative Audit Bureau reports that Governor Evers still has sole discretion over $2.2 billion in unspent ARPA funds and $86 million in unspent CARES Act funds. Speaker Robin Vos said that if the projected surplus materializes, then he’d propose cutting taxes for everyone, and not, quote: “pick winners and losers like Tony Evers does with this vote-buying ploy.”
The Wisconsin Department of Revenue is expected to detail the projected surplus in the next few days.
