BATON ROUGE – Hardline lawmakers in the Louisiana Legislature continue to insist that any talk of raising taxes focuses only on working families. Clinging to stubborn partisanship, these holdouts are refusing to do the hard work of governing. Instead of insisting corporate interests pay their fair share, certain elements of the GOP are only willing to talk about raising sales taxes that impact consumers and working families.
Democrats and a broad swath of responsible Republicans have gone to great lengths in a bipartisan effort to address the budget debacle. But the hardline partisans are protecting their corporate backers at the expense of the people who elected them. Irresponsible holdouts threaten to wreck the progress that has been made in finding solutions to the $2 billion budget gap left behind by the Jindal administration. Responsible lawmakers from across the political spectrum are working together to address threats to higher education, healthcare and essential services. Faced with such potentially dire consequences, hardline partisan holdouts are trying to protect corporations from having to pay their fair share.
“Our state’s lawmakers are paid to do a job, and we’re calling on them now to step up and get their work done,” said Stephen Handwerk, executive director of the Louisiana Democratic Party. “The hardliners who are holding out against compromise to protect corporations at the expense of working people aren’t doing their job. The state is facing a crisis, and this is no time for stubbornness and partisanship. We need leaders who will help move our state forward.”
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