Senate Republicans derailed a Democratic “Buffett rule” bill Monday forcing the nation’s top earners to pay at least 30 percent of their income in taxes, using the day before Americans’ taxes are due to defy President Barack Obama on one of his signature election-year issues.
By a near party-line 51-45 tally, senators voted to keep the bill alive but fell nine votes short of the 60 needed to continue debating the measure. The anti-climactic outcome was no surprise to anyone in a vote that was designed more to win over voters and embarrass senators in close races than to push legislation into law.
At the White House, Obama denounced the vote, saying Republicans chose “once again to protect tax breaks for the wealthiest few Americans at the expense of the middle class.” In a statement issued after the vote, he said he would keep pressing Congress to help the middle class.
“It’s just plain wrong that millions of middle-class Americans pay a higher share of their income in taxes than some millionaires and billionaires,” he said.
Republicans called the measure a divisive Democratic distraction from the nation’s real problems that would not address the economy’s real woes.
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