Tammy Baldwin claim that Eric Hovde supports tax plan that benefits the rich is correct

As the race for the U.S. Senate heats up in Wisconsin, incumbent U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin and challenger Republican Eric Hovde are launching attacks on each other over just about every topic. 

In an Oct. 11 interview on "The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell," Baldwin took aim at Hovde’s tax plan, or at least one he says he will support. 

"He supports a $4 trillion tax plan that would disproportionately advantage the well-off and profitable corporations," she said. "We need to fight for tax cuts for working families,"

When we asked Baldwin’s campaign for more information, they shared a document containing a number of links to articles showing Hovde has publicly supported extending the tax cuts in the 2017 tax bill created by former President Donald Trump.

According to a Sept. 4 report from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Hovde is advocating for extending Republican President Donald Trump’s 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which he says puts small and medium businesses on a more even playing field with larger corporations. 

The law also lowered tax rates across the board and shifted the thresholds for several income tax brackets. While the cuts reduced taxes across the board, the largest savings were seen for those in the highest income brackets. 

That tax plan could add an additional $4 trillion to the U.S. debt, according to an Oct. 7 report from NPR.

The report cited an analysis by the nonpartisan nonprofit Committee for Responsible Federal Budget, which found that Trump’s tax plan would cause about $7.5 trillion of debt over the next decade, while Vice President Kamala Harris’ would add about $3.5 trillion. So that $4 trillion number comes from that analysis — the difference between the plans shared by the Trump and Harris campaigns.  

As a part of that plan, Trump wants to make his tax cuts permanent, the report said. 

Featured Fact-check

Eric Hovde

stated on November 12, 2024 in X, formerly Twitter

Says the election results are suspicious because opponent U.S. Sen. Baldwin won “nearly 90%” of absentee ballots in Milwaukee.

But that doesn’t really get into who those tax cuts benefit. 

According to a June 13 report from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a nonpartisan research and policy institute, Trump’s 2017 tax cuts mostly benefited the rich. If left in place, the tax plan would leave those cuts in place. 

Households with incomes in the top 1 percent received a tax cut of more than $60,000, and households in the bottom 60% will receive a $500 average tax cut in 2025, the report said. 

"As a share of after-tax income, tax cuts at the top — both for households in the top 1 percent and the top 5 percent – are more than triple the total value of the tax cuts received for people with incomes in the bottom 60 percent," the report said. 

So, yes, the tax cuts that Hovde has publicly supported and endorsed would benefit the rich more than middle-class workers. And it’s likely that those same cuts would raise the U.S. debt, too. 

A Hovde campaign spokesperson did not respond to multiple requests for comment. And Hovde’s campaign website doesn’t list any sort of tax plan, and he hasn’t spoken at length about a tax plan, either.

Baldwin claimed that Hovde "supports a $4 trillion tax plan that would disproportionately advantage the well-off and profitable corporations."

Hovde has publicly supported extending the 2017 tax cuts Donald Trump put in place. Research has shown that those tax cuts are more likely to benefit the ultrarich, while the middle class receives less of a benefit. This proposal isn’t new in any way — it would simply continue the status quo. And although everyone benefited from those tax cuts, the wealthy saw the biggest savings when paying their taxes, instead of low and middle-class Americans.  

We rate this claim as Mostly True, meaning the statement is accurate but needs clarification or additional information.