Republicans celebrated their first legislative win of the year Wednesday, after both houses of Congress passed a sweeping tax reform package.
But one Democratic congresswoman told Cheddar there’s still hope for constituents who remain opposed to the bill.
“Stay mobilized, let your voice be heard,” Representative Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-NJ) said Wednesday morning, after the Senate voted, but before the House reconvened. “Nothing is permanent but death and taxes, and we can do something about these taxes and we can do something about the makeup of this Congress.”
The president and his party leaders gathered Wednesday afternoon to praise the benefits of the tax system overhaul, which drops the corporate tax rate from 35 to 21 percent, nearly doubles the standard deduction for individuals, and lowers the tax rate for most income brackets.
While the GOP says the long-overdue changes will provide a boost to the economy, Democrats dispute that claim and say the bill will largely benefit the wealthiest Americans and balloon the deficit.
The bill does appear to be broadly unpopular. A recent CNN poll found that 55 percent of respondents opposed the legislation, a 10 percentage point increase since last month. Still, it passed the House by a vote of 224-201 Wednesday afternoon, with only 12 Republican naysayers.
Republicans also took to Twitter to cheer the victory. President Donald Trump posted a gif that read “Tax Cut for Christmas”.
For full interview [click here](https://cheddar.com/videos/rep-bonnie-watson-coleman-d-nj-says-voters-can-change-the-makeup-of-congress-in-2018).
The S&P 500 climbed 0.4% after wavering between small gains and losses in the early going.
An autopsy commissioned for George Floyd’s family found that Floyd died of asphyxiation due to neck and back compression when a Minneapolis police officer kneeled on his neck for several minutes and ignored his cries of distress, the Floyd family’s attorneys said Monday.
Facebook employees are using Twitter to register their frustration over CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s decision to leave up posts by President Donald Trump that suggested protesters in Minneapolis could be shot.
Federal health authorities have received reports of nearly 26,000 nursing home residents dying from COVID-19, according to materials prepared for the nation's governors. That number is partial and likely to go higher.
Leslie Ricard Chambers, deputy executive counsel for Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards, talked to Cheddar Monday morning, as cities across the country woke up after another night of unrest.
President Donald Trump is deriding the nation’s governors as “weak” and demanding tougher crackdowns on protesters in the aftermath of more violent protests in dozens of American cities.
President Donald Trump spent time in a White House bunker during Friday night's protests outside the executive mansion. Secret Service agents rushed him there as some of the demonstrators were throwing rocks and tugging at police barricades.
America’s cities boarded up windows, swept up glass and covered graffiti Sunday as the country's most significant night of protests in a half-century spilled into another day of unrest fueled by killings of black people at the hands of police.
From Wall Street to Silicon Valley, these are the top stories that moved markets and had investors, business leaders, and entrepreneurs talking this week on Cheddar.
Minnesota authorities say the police officer who knelt on George Floyd has been arrested
