Tag: taxes

Squad member Jamaal Bowman on slave reparations – says he wants ALL 42 MILLION black Americans to get $333,000 and reveals ‘creative ways’ to pay them

A New York lawmaker is calling for every black person in the US to receive $333,000 as reparations for slavery.

Jamaal Bowman is among nine backers of federal bill H.R. 414, which states there is a ‘moral and legal obligation’ to make restitution to the descendants of slaves.

The legislation would force the government to distribute $14 trillion between almost 42 million black Americans.

The figure is based on academics’ estimates of the amount the US benefited from forced labor between 1619 and the end of slavery in 1865, according to the bill.

Yonkers representative Bowman, a member of the so-called ‘Squad’ of young controversial Democrats in Congress, also suggested ‘creative’ ways of paying, including staggering the payments over a number of years.

He also claims the federal government’s response to the pandemic and the space race prove it has the capacity for the program. 

‘When COVID was destroying us, we invested in the American people in a way that kept the economy afloat,’ Bowman told the Journal News. ‘The government can invest the same way in reparations without raising taxes on anyone.’

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Feds To Spend Hundreds of Millions of Dollars on E.V. Chargers in ‘Disadvantaged Communities’

Last week, the White House announced that the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) would issue $623 million in grants for states to build chargers for electric vehicles (E.V.s). The money comes from the Charging and Fuel Infrastructure Discretionary Grant Program, a $2.5 billion fund established as part of the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. According to the announcement, the project “will fund 47 EV charging and alternative-fueling infrastructure projects in 22 states and Puerto Rico, including construction of approximately 7,500 EV charging ports.”

Unfortunately, that money is unlikely to go as far as it would have in private hands. “The CFI Program advances President Biden’s Justice40 Initiative, which set a goal that 40% of the overall benefits of federal investments flow to disadvantaged communities that are marginalized by underinvestment and overburdened by pollution,” bragged the FHWA press release. “More than 70% of the CFI funding announced today will support project sites in disadvantaged communities.”

As an example, it notes “$1.4 million to the Chilkoot Indian Association, an Alaska Native Tribe, to build an EV charging station in Haines, a rural and disadvantaged community where there are no publicly available EV charging stations.”

Haines is in Haines Borough, Alaska, which has a population of just over 2,000 people.

It’s hard to imagine that “disadvantaged” communities would buy E.V.s if only there were public charging stations available. A November survey from S&P Global Mobility showed that potential buyers cite high E.V. prices as their primary concern, higher than concerns about range or charging infrastructure. And while E.V. prices have declined in recent years, the average new electric vehicle still costs around $50,000.

Not that this is the first instance of poorly planned government spending on E.V. infrastructure. Last month, Reason reported that even though the federal government had dispensed $2 billion out of the $7.5 billion apportioned by the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act to build public charging stations, no chargers funded by the cash had come online. Speaking to Politico‘s James Bikales, state and E.V. industry officials blamed “the difficulties state agencies and charging companies face in meeting a complex set of contracting requirements and minimum operating standards for the federally-funded chargers.”

“The barrier isn’t technological,” The Wall Street Journal‘s editorial board noted this week. “It took Tesla less time to install 80 chargers at its Harris Ranch station in northern California.” Rather, “the bureaucrats are getting in their own way.”

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20 Percent of Welfare Spending Goes to the Households Taxed To Fund It

About one in every five dollars that passes through the federal welfare system ends up right back where it started, according to a new report.

It’s not robbing Peter to pay Paul. It’s more like “robbing Peter to pay Peter,” wrote the report’s author, Judge Glock, director of research at the Manhattan Institute.

As the federal welfare state has grown to a point where many middle-class and even some upper-income households receive benefits, it has become more common for the same households to both pay federal taxes and collect federal transfer payments. Glock’s paper shows how significant that overlap is: About 20 percent of the annual funds in the federal welfare system are simply returned to households that paid that amount in federal taxes.

And if you don’t count households that are receiving Social Security—the largest federal welfare program, even though it is rarely identified as such—the percentage of welfare payments canceled out by taxes within the same year is 29 percent, Glock’s research shows.

Seems like those individuals and families would be better off simply not paying so much in taxes in the first place.

“Such a system of taxing and returning the same amount of money is a pure waste,” Glock wrote, “since both the taxes and transfers limit households’ options, and there is a bureaucratic cost to circulating income from households to the government and back to households.”

Economically, those transfers and taxes simply cancel each other out and households are left—on a balance sheet, at least—no worse off than if the money had never been taken by the government and then returned.

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REVEALED: How American and Chinese scientists sought to create a virus in 2018 that was almost an EXACT match with Covid

Bombshell new documents shed light on a shady 2018 project between US and Chinese scientists to create a novel virus with the same rare features seen in Covid.

The proposals lay out plans to use US taxpayer money to engineer bat coronaviruses with several properties that would make them infectious to humans – a year before the pandemic happened.

The documents – which consist of hundreds of emails, grant applications and scientific papers – highlighted four characteristics that would make the new viruses a ‘clear… danger of a new SARS-like pandemic.’  

All four characteristics spelled out in the research proposal match features of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid, according to a watchdog who exposed the files, as well as several experts who reviewed them.

The experiments, part of a grant known as DEFUSE, were to be a collaboration between US scientists and the Wuhan Institute of Virology, which is where the FBI and many scientists believe Covid leaked from. 

The proposal was ultimately denied funding and there are no official records that the experiments were actually carried out. Nonetheless, virology experts have called the records are a clear ‘blueprint’ to create Covid-19. 

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Missouri Courts Ask For $3.7 Million To Continue Expunging Past Marijuana Convictions

Missouri circuit courts have cleared more than 100,000 marijuana charges from people’s criminal records so far—a mandate that was a big selling point for those who voted to pass the constitutional amendment that legalized recreational marijuana in 2022.

However, court officials say it’s hard to determine how many more charges are left because many court records are not digitized.

Missouri court officials are set to request another $3.7 million to complete marijuana expungements in the coming budget year, making their case Wednesday to a House appropriations committee.

By law, any revenue the state collects from taxes on recreational marijuana sales, along with fees the businesses pay, must first go towards the state’s costs of regulating the program. Then it goes to expenses incurred by the court system for expunging certain marijuana offenses from people’s criminal records.

Last year lawmakers signed off on $4.5 million for state courts to pay their employees overtime or to hire temp workers to complete the massive number of expungements required by law. They approved an additional $2.5 million in a supplemental budget on May 5.

Circuit courts must request funds to reimburse their expenses for completing expungements from the Circuit Court Budget Committee, which oversees the special assistance program.

So far, the committee has given $4.2 million to the county courts, said Beth Riggert, communications counsel of the Missouri Supreme Court. And the committee has allocated the funds to any circuit court that has requested it, she said.

“Some circuit courts have advised they have not requested special assistance funds because they did not have current court clerks willing or able to work overtime,” Riggert said, “and/or have been unable to find qualified individuals to provide special assistance because the analysis required is complicated and better done by experienced personnel, such as retired clerks.”

As of January 2, Missouri courts have granted 103,558 expungements. Out of all the counties, Greene County has received the most funding, nearly $940,000, and has completed the most expungements at 4,306.

After Greene, the counties that have completed the most expungements are not necessarily the largest counties or the ones that have received the most money.

The second highest number is 3,515 from Laclede County, which has a population of 36,000. The county has received a little more than $35,000 from the special assistance program.

In third place is St. Louis County, the state’s largest county with more than a million people, where court officials have processed 3,479 expungements. The county has received just over $135,000. The court has reviewed 11,300 files, a spokesman for the 21st Circuit Court said.

Franklin County, which has a population of 104,000, is fourth, completing 3,200 expungements and receiving about $53,000. Franklin is just ahead of Jackson County, which has a population of 717,000. Jackson has completed 2,900 and received nearly $195,000.

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Journalist Uncovers “Shadowy Network” Of NGOs Facilitating US Border Invasion

Journalist James O’Keefe uncovered a “shadowy network of secretive nonprofits” (some of which are funded by taxpayers) that are facilitating the invasion of illegals on the southern border. 

O’Keefe said “Alita’s Angels” is a “brand-new nonprofit with no tax records on file” that operates inside an old Bank Building in the Arizona border town of Nogales.

We just followed the trail of the migrant vans right to the source, visiting the Arizona border town of Nogales, where we encountered some rude and suspicious “Alita’s Angels” NGO (@alitasangels) workers who once again called the police on us. 

A volunteer with the American Red Cross, who wouldn’t give us his name, tried to prevent us from filming outside a migrant facility and kept sticking his hand over our cameras. Then, when we questioned a volunteer with the NGO, she said “I am your father” and stormed off. 

Nogales Police officers showed up and questioned us after Alitas and Red Cross workers falsely accused us of using racial slurs and inhibiting their movement. We tried to get the officer’s first name but he refused to give it. When we FOIAed the bodycam footage, we were told Nogales police don’t use them. 

A group called “Alita’s Angels” runs the facility, but they’re a brand-new nonprofit with no tax records on file. (We requested the documents, with no luck.) -O’Keefe

After Alitas, the migrants are crammed into busses like cattle to a processing facility an hour away in Tucson. 

Once the migrants were boarded on the bus, we got a head start to meet them at a processing facility an hour away in Tucson, but once again, we couldn’t get anywhere near the building. The staff of the facility, run by Casa Alitas, threatened to call the cops again, but we managed to interview a local driver who does business at the facility and he gave us even more information. -O’Keefe

O’Keefe said, “A WORKER with Casa Alitas CONFIRMED TO OUR UNDERCOVER journalist that Casa Alitas was getting federal money.” 

“These “Alitas” (http://alitasangels.com) groups are part of a shadowy network of secretive nonprofits funding the mass migration of millions of people into the country, without truly vetting asylum seekers’ claims and determining if they are eligible for refugee status,” the journalist continued. 

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UBI Is the Trojan Horse of Economic Ruin

In an era where the siren song of Universal Basic Income (UBI) captivates many, we must critically examine the harsh realities beneath its alluring veil. UBI, with its promise of fixed income for all, irrespective of employment status, emerges not just as an economic folly, but a direct affront to the principles of liberty.

UBI represents a grand experiment in economic alchemy, an attempt to materialize prosperity from the fumes of fiscal irresponsibility. Proponents hail it as a cure-all for poverty, a silver bullet to eradicate financial woes. However, this illusion crumbles under scrutiny, revealing a scheme fundamentally at odds with individual responsibility and freedom. The redistribution of wealth, central to UBI, fosters a culture of entitlement creating a recipe for economic disaster.

There is nothing “universal” about the government picking the pockets of the industrious to line the wallets of others. This is not empowerment; it’s robbery and subservience dressed in the garb of charity. The government, acting as a paternalistic overlord, decides who gets what, how much, and when. UBI’s one-size-fits-all approach overlooks the diverse needs and challenges of individuals.

Economically, UBI is akin to quicksand. The idea that a state can indefinitely sustain its citizens without encouraging productivity is dangerously naïve. Such a system would lead to inflationary pressures, devaluing currency, and resulting in a vicious cycle of increasing handouts and decreasing value, ultimately stalling economic growth and innovation.

The fiscal implications are stark. Funding UBI would necessitate astronomical levels of taxation and debt, burdening future generations with today’s reckless financial decisions. This approach, effectively extorting Peter to pay Paul, where Peter represents the hardworking populace, undermines the foundation of a robust economy.

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New York Governor Proposes Repealing Marijuana Potency Tax To Reduce Costs And Combat Illicit Market

The governor of New York is calling for the elimination of a THC potency tax as part of her executive budget, aiming to reduce costs for consumers in a way that could make the regulated market more competitive against illicit operators.

Gov. Kathy Hochul’s (D) budget proposal for the 2025 fiscal year would repeal the potency tax and replace it with a wholesale excise tax of 9 percent in a way that “simplifies, streamlines, and reduces the tax collection obligations and burden for cultivators, processors, and distributors.”

Cannabis would also still be subject to the existing 9 percent state retail excise tax and four percent local retail excise tax. The changes are estimated to effectively drive down the total tax rate on marijuana from an average 38 percent to 22 percent.

For vertically-integrated medical cannabis operators and microbusinesses, the new wholesale excise tax would accrue on the final retail sale to consumers and be imposed on 75 percent of the final retail sales price, the governor’s proposal says.

The briefing book for the budget says the tax changes would “promote and support the expansion of the legal adult-use cannabis market” and also result in a “net positive impact” of $6.5 million for localities.

But by reducing costs for consumers and businesses, the tax policy reform could also help the administration and regulators address one of their top priorities: driving out the illicit market.

While licensing of legal marijuana businesses has rolled out slowly amid litigation, New York has been dealing with a proliferation of hundreds of unregulated cannabis shops with prices that are generally lower because the operators don’t concern themselves with excise taxes and abiding by other regulations that increase costs.

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Biden Administration Continues To Escalate Tensions In The Balkans Selling Javelin Missiles To Kosovo

The Biden Administration has approved the sale of hundreds of Javelin anti-tank missiles to Kosovo for an estimated cost of $75 million, in a move designed to increase tensions with Serbia and assert American military might in the region.

This latest move comes on the heels of its covert support for a coup attempt in Serbia, followed by threats to launch an all-out war against Serbs in Bosnia who are seeking self-determination.

The government in Kosovo “requested” to purchase 246 Javelin missiles and 24 lightweight command launch units, among other items, according to a statement released by the U.S. Defense Security Cooperation Agency.

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Maryland Medicaid Will Now Cover Sex Change Procedures and Treatments – Even Voice Lessons and Hair Removal

Maryland will now cover an unprecedented number of sex change procedures and treatments through the taxpayer-funded Medicaid program.

Even hair removal and voice lessons for transgender people can be covered.

A law that went into effect in the state on January 1 requires Medicaid to cover “gender-affirming treatment in a nondiscriminatory manner.”

This includes breast implants, fertility preservation services, facial cosmetic surgeries, hair alterations, and much more.

According to a report from the far-left LGBTQ Nation, “Voice therapy and lessons, scar and hair removal, hormone therapy, puberty blockers, fertility preservation, and ‘alterations’ to the abdomen, genitals, chest, buttocks, neck, and face are all included. Patients cannot be denied unless a healthcare professional decides the treatment would be detrimental to their health.”

Detransition procedures will also be covered.

Maryland Medicaid already covered mental health services, hormone replacement therapy, and sex change surgeries.

A transgender biological male who uses the name “Renee Lau” told CBS News that he is planning to take advantage of the change.

“I plan on having some surgeries and having consultations within the next two months. I would not believe the relief it is for me, because I never could have paid for [these services] out of pocket,” Lau said.

“It’s an emotional relief,” he added.

According to the report, “There are around 24,000 transgender adults in Maryland, according to research from UCLA’s Williams Institute. Of those, around 6,000 are enrolled in Medicaid.”

Maryland Governor Wed Moore signed an executive order protecting sex change treatments during a Pride event in the state last year.

“In the state of Maryland, nobody should have to justify their own humanity,” Moore said while signing the order.

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