Contact Oregon’s Congressional Delegation

Demand ending the tax breaks for millionaires in the CARES Act to pay for what’s needed: rental assistance, foreclosure prevention, homeless services, true small business support, extended unemployment, etc…

House and Senate leaders are currently debating the scope of the next coronavirus package. The next few weeks will be critical for advocates as we work together to ensure it’s done right.

Please contact your Congressional representative and Oregon’s senators. Tell them you support taking back the tax breaks in the CARES Act using H.R.6579 which will amend the Internal Revenue Code to again limit the carryback of net operating losses and to restore and make permanent the limitation on excess business losses. This legislation and a companion bill in the Senate is sponsored by Rep. Doggett and Sen. Whitehouse, with 51 co-sponsors.

Congress should use the $135 billion this bill will save for people who are actually hurting. If your representatives haven’t signed on, urge them to do so; if they have, let’s thank them. Scroll to bottom for contact info.

What to ask for?

President Trump’s $2 trillion CARES Act gave big tax cuts to corporations and wealthy individuals at the expense of the people who really need the money. The CARES Act included $135 billion in tax breaks over 10 years, with most of it occurring in the next two years. People making $1 million or more will get 82% of the tax breaks. There are only 43,000 taxpayers with that kind of income.Their tax cuts will average $1.6 million each! In Oregon, likely only 400 taxpayers will get these tax breaks. By comparison, everyone else is getting a one-time rebate check of $1,200 per adult and $500 per child. This is unconscionable.

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) and Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-TX) have introduced bicameral legislation to take back these tax breaks. 

According to the Sen. Whitehouse, the bill would “repeal a massive tax giveaway for a small group of wealthy taxpayers…included in the coronavirus relief bill. The legislation would do away with provisions in the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act that the nonpartisan Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT, Title II.C.4) estimates will reduce government revenue by $135 billion (revised estimate 4.27.20) over ten years, and that would overwhelmingly benefit wealthy taxpayers like hedge fund managers and real estate speculators.”

Our Senate and House members need to hear that we want them to repeal the tax breaks in the next CARES bill. For a full understanding of how this tax break was applied and action to take, click here: https://americansfortaxfairness.org/covid/

In Whitehouse’s assessment: “Tax giveaways for a wealthy few shouldn’t have come near a coronavirus relief bill. Relief legislation ought to address the needs of small businesses and workers, not fleece taxpayers to benefit real estate moguls and hedge fund billionaires. By repealing these special interest giveaways, we can free up billions of dollars for federal assistance our communities and economy so desperately need”.

We agree with co-sponsor Rep. Doggett who said that the CARES Act tax break means that “While American families anxiously await modest relief checks, the richest slice of the 1% have already been cared for…in the CARES Act—at about $1.6 million each. The ultrarich can claim paper losses during boom times before the pandemic even began. This provision isn’t about coronavirus, working families or small businesses struggling to stay afloat. It is just more insider politics to get millions to those who have millions, especially real estate investors and hedge fund managers. Repealing this giveaway will free resources needed to help those truly in need.” 

Please write to your members of Congress asking them to repeal the outrageous business tax giveaways in the CARES Act which only aggravate the already appalling inequality this country faces today. Rather than creating more tax loopholes for multi-million dollar businesses and the wealthy, we should be reducing income inequality.

We think there’s a credible chance of getting this tax break repealed or at least pared back. The House legislation (co-sponsored by Blumenauer and DeFazio) that proposes to repeal this tax loophole is in Ways and Means. We just learned that today, the Senate repeal bill is being introduced with at least 21 cosponsors! Sen. Merkley is one of them! Please keep up the pressure. Thank some and push the others today.

Contact your Members of Congress

Step One – Find your Representative

Find out who represents you in Congress! Every Oregonian is represented by Senator Ron Wyden and Senator Jeff Merkley. Find who represents you in the US House of Representatives by looking up your address here: https://www.govtrack.us/

Step Two—What to say? Sample script

Please ensure the next Congressional relief package ends the #MillionairesGiveaway in the CARES Act. Address the urgent needs of people in economic distress, not the wallets of the wealthy who clearly don’t face dire straits. H.R. 6579 and its companion in the Senate are needed in and of themselves; they should never have been enacted. The $135 billion which will be freed up with passage can pay for help where it is actually needed.

Thank Oregon Reps co-sponsoring the #MillionairesGiveaway

If you live in Congressman Earl Blumenauer’s district (OR-3), Congressman Peter DeFazio’s district (OR-4) write or call them and Senator Merkley and say: something like:

THANK YOU for being a co-sponsor of H.R. 6579, and the Senate bill to end the egregious #MillionairesGiveaway. The beneficiaries of the tax breaks in the CARES Act are not those we should be helping with tax breaks, now or ever.

Ask other Oregon members of Congress to sign on

Ask Senator Wyden and Representatives Bonamici, Schrader and Walden to support the legislation sponsored by Senator Whitehouse and Congressman Doggett and request that their names be added to the co-sponsors’ list here.

Personalize your story

If your unemployment took too long to arrive, or you would benefit from the tax breaks but you know you don’t need them, please say a few sentences about that.

It’s so important that our lawmakers know what’s happening in our communities.

Step three – How to contact Oregon’s Congressional delegation

Call or email your Congressional Representatives at:

Congresswoman Bonamici (OR-1)

Congressman Walden (OR-2)

Congressman Blumenauer. (OR-3)

Congressman DeFazio (OR-4)

Congressman Schrader (OR-5)

Call or email our Senators at:

Senator Merkley

Senator Wyden