{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.portman.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases?ID=D7A5EFE0-1E6F-4658-85B3-386DA1809F42", "Portman: Every Income Level Gets Tax Relief, Three Million More People Will Have No Tax Liability", "2017-12-14", "2017", "2017-12", "Republican", "House", "OH", "Rob Portman", "P000449", "www.portman.senate.gov", null, null, "legacy", "WASHINGTON, D.C. \u2013U.S. Senator Rob Portman (R-OH), who was appointed to serve on a House-Senate conference committee that is negotiating the final tax reform bill, discussed with Joint Committee on Taxation Chief of Staff Tom Barthold how tax reform will help provide tax relief to every tax bracket and will give three million Americans\u2014who currently have tax liability and are working hard\u2014no tax liability at all. Portman, who has held six tax reform roundtables in Ohio with local business leaders in recent months, has been vocal on the national stage calling for tax reform, including during recent interviews on CBS This Morning, Fox News, CNN, CNBC, Fox Business, Bloomberg TV, and NBC\u2019s Meet The Press twice, as well as recently in op-eds in the Akron Beacon Journal, Cleveland Plain Dealer, Delaware Gazette, and Cincinnati Enquirer. The tax reform effort is widely supported by Ohio small businesses, manufacturers, farmers, and other state and local organizations.\r\nTranscript of his remarks can be found below and a video can be found here.\r\nPortman: \u201cMy colleague and friend from\u00a0Michigan was asking about the\u00a0effects of the tax cuts for the\u00a0middle class. So, Mr. Barthold, she asked about\u00a02019, let\u2019s go to your form,\u00a0let\u2019s go to your Joint Committee\u00a0on Taxation distributional table\u00a0that anybody can find on\u00a0JCT.gov.\u00a0Let\u2019s go to jcx-60-17 and that\u2019s\u00a0for 2019, the same year that was\u00a0just asked about.\u00a0I\u2019m looking at 10 different\u00a0groups of taxpayers\u2014cohorts of taxpayers.\u00a0Less than $10,000 all the way up\u00a0to $1 million or over.\u00a0So for instance, $30,000 to $40,000,\u00a0$75,000 to $100,000 and so on.\u00a0I\u2019m looking at this form and I\u2019m\u00a0wondering how could what we\u00a0just heard be true because this\u00a0shows that there is tax relief\u00a0in each of those groups, right?\u201d Barthold: \u201cThat\u2019s correct, sir. Aggregate tax reduction in\u00a0every income category.\u201d Portman: \u201cEvery single one.\u00a0On average, in every single\u00a0one of these groups, you\u2019re\u00a0seeing tax relief and it is, you\u00a0know, 9.7 percent decrease in taxes for folks making\u00a0between $30,000 and $40,000, people\u00a0between $100,000 and $200,000 at 6.8 percent.\u00a0It tends to be a higher number\u00a0toward the lower brackets, but\u00a0that\u2019s on your website, that\u2019s\u00a0the information, so that means\u00a0there is tax relief for these\u00a0individuals that we represent,\u00a0is that correct?\u201d Barthold: \u201cIn aggregate, yes, and on average.\u201d Portman: \u201cAnd for the majority of those\u00a0people, correct?\u201d Barthold: \u201cYes.\u201d\u00a0 Portman: \u201cOkay.\u00a0I just wanted to clear that up. In terms of people who,\u00a0because of the doubling of the\u00a0standard deduction\u2014which is as\u00a0you say is like a zero tax\u00a0bracket of $24,000 per family by doubling it\u2014aren\u2019t there a lot of people\u00a0that fall off the tax rules altogether? In other words, there are people who aren\u2019t even going\u00a0to have any tax liability who\u00a0have it now.\u00a0I sent you a letter on this back\u00a0in October and you said that\u00a03.1 million taxpayers would no\u00a0longer have tax liability who have tax liability now.\u00a0Most of these people are folks\u00a0who are working who have tax\u00a0liability. Under this\u00a0bill they\u2019re not going to have\u00a0any tax liability.\u00a0Think about that. This is three million Americans who are currently having to pay Uncle Sam, and are working hard\u2014most of these people are folks who are working, who have tax liability despite the Earned Income Tax Credit and other things\u2014under this bill they\u2019re not going to have any tax liability. That was based on a doubling of\u00a0the standard deduction but it\u00a0was only with the child credit up to\u00a0$1,500. So I would think\u00a0with a child credit up to $2,000,\u00a0which we have now, doubling the\u00a0child tax credit, I would guess even more\u00a0people are not going to have tax\u00a0liability, is that your sense?\u201d Barthold: \u201cThat\u2019s correct, Senator Portman.\u00a0Also another factor there is that when you and\u00a0I spoke about this in October,\u00a0you did not have a 10 percent bracket\u00a0which increases (inaudible)\u201d\u00a0 Portman: \u201cSo more than three million people\u00a0are not going to have any tax liability at all. I just think we need to stick to the facts here.\u201d\r\n###", 1, "2026-03-30T12:14:52Z", "2026-03-30T12:14:52Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://www.portman.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases?ID=D7A5EFE0-1E6F-4658-85B3-386DA1809F42"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 1.5944424085319042, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}