
Stephen Moore. (Photo: unleashprosperity.com)
California Congressional Democrats Voted for Largest Tax Increase in American History
Globe Interviews Stephen Moore: Making Trump’s 2017 tax cuts permanent protects the average taxpayer from a 22 percent tax hike
By Katy Grimes, May 19, 2025 4:52 pm
California’s Democrat Members of Congress just tried to unleash the largest tax increase in history by voting against making President Donald Trump’s 2017 tax cuts permanent in the “One Big Beautiful Bill,” also known as H.Con.Res.14.
Every Congressional Democrat voted against the tax cuts.
“If we don’t pass this bill, it will be the biggest tax increase in history,” Stephen Moore told the Globe Monday.
Moore, co-Founder of Unleash Prosperity Now, and the author of “Who’s the Fairest of Them All?: The Truth about Opportunity, Taxes, and Wealth in America,” warns that if Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill” is not passed, every family in America will pay $2,000 to $3,000 more per year in taxes – and that is just for starters.
It will be a 20% increase on small businesses. California Small businesses are already suffering and have been for many years under two very left-wing Democrat governors – former Governor Jerry Brown and Governor Gavin Newsom. Many businesses have fled California for low-tax, low regulatory states. Since 2020 over 500 companies have either left California completely, or built and expanded operations in a low-tax state, shrinking their California operations.
Without the bill passed, we will revert back to the old tax system – standard deductions will be cut and high taxes will once again plague the country.
Notably, in 2023, Moore reported, “We now have incontrovertible evidence that after five years since they took effect, the Trump tax rate cuts of 2017 raised revenues over this time period.”
“In other words, revenues were up 40% in five years. The evidence through the first three years of the tax cut finds that the share of taxes paid by the wealthiest 1% rose as well. So much for this being a tax giveaway for the rich.”
In a recent Fox Business appearance, Stephen Moore said Trump’s 2017 tax cut “was an enormous driver of economic success and raised revenue for the government, contrary to predictions of ‘tax cuts for millionaires.’ The average small business saw a 20% reduction in their tax rates, and the corporate rate fell from the highest in the world at 35% to below average at now 21%. Middle-class families saved more than $2,000.”
So why do Democrats want to let the tax cuts expire? They’ve got nothing but “tax cuts for millionaires” – which is patently false. They must not like the American people very much.
The U.S. House Ways and Means Committee explains that the tax cuts need to be extended to continue to “provide tax relief for families, workers, small businesses, manufacturers, and farmers. The One, Big, Beautiful Bill, makes the successful 2017 Trump tax cuts permanent, provides additional tax relief for working families and small businesses, rewards investment and manufacturing in America, and holds woke elites accountable while ending tax giveaways to the wealthy, China, and illegal immigrants.”
“Instead of a $1,700 tax hike, working families still recovering from Biden’s inflation crisis will now receive on average a $1,300 tax cut and workers will get $3,300 more in real income back into their pockets. Permanence of the 2017 Trump tax cuts will save 6 million jobs, including 1.1 million manufacturing jobs.”
Notably, California Rep. Adam Gray (D-CA-13) and Rep. Derek Tran (D-CA-45), two new Democrats who managed to flip Republican congressional seats, voted for the higher tax rate, fewer deductions, the universally-despised alternate minimum tax, and evil death tax.
Moore told the Globe that if the 2017 Trump tax cuts got rid of the alternative minimum tax for 90% of the people paying for it. The alternative minimum tax is a tax imposed by the U.S. government in addition to the regular income tax for certain individuals, estates, and trusts. (emphasis the Globe)
The Trump tax cuts also eliminated the family death tax by half who were forced to pay it.
“Eighty percent of the American taxpayers got tax breaks – non-rich people,” Moore reiterated. “This is not a tax cut for the rich,” – which Democrats continue claiming, conflating small and medium sized business owners with Silicon Valley wealth.
Every American is facing a 22% tax increase if Trump’s tax cuts are not approved.
The Ways and Means Committee explains the details:
- Makes the 2017 Trump tax cuts permanent – protecting the average taxpayer from a 22 percent tax hike.
- Delivers an additional $1,300 tax cut for the average American family.
- Saves the average American family $1,700 – the equivalent of 9 weeks of groceries.
- Increasing real annual take-home pay for a median-income household with two children by roughly $4,000 to $5,000.
- Raising annual real wages by $2,100 to $3,300 per worker.
- Delivers on President Trump’s priorities of no tax on tips, overtime pay, and car loan interest, and provides additional tax relief for seniors.
- Locks in and boosts the doubled Child Tax Credit for more than 40 million families and provides additional tax relief for American families.
- Preserves and increases the doubled guaranteed deduction for 91 percent of all taxpayers.
- Expands 529 education savings accounts to empower American families and students to choose the education that best fits their needs, whether it is K-12 materials or obtaining a postsecondary trades credential.
- Supports working families by expanding access to child care and making permanent the paid leave tax credit.
- Puts American families in control of their health care by expanding health savings accounts and cementing into law a Trump Administration policy that offers more choice and flexibility for health coverage options.
- Starts building financial security for America’s children at birth with the creation of new savings accounts.

In Democrat Rep. Adam Gray’s district (CA-13), the average taxpayer in CA-13 would see a 27% tax hike if the Trump Tax Cuts expire. A family of 4 making $65,557, the median income in CA-13, would see a $1,243 tax increase if the Trump Tax Cuts expire. This is worth about 6 weeks of groceries to a typical family of 4 in the region. The Child tax credit would be cut in half for the 105,240 families who claim it on their taxes, guaranteed deductions cut in half, the 37,430 Small Businesses in CA-13 would be hit with a 43.4% tax rate if the 199A Small Business Deduction expires, the Alternative Minimum Tax will return, and the 5,065 Family-Owned Farms in CA-13 would have their Death Tax Exemption slashed in half next year, Ways and Means reports.

In Democrat Rep. Derek Trans district (CA-45), the average taxpayer in CA-45 would see a 19% tax hike if the Trump Tax Cuts expire. A family of 4 making $102,317, the median income in CA-45, would see a $2,346 tax increase if the Trump Tax Cuts expire. This is worth about 11 weeks of groceries to a typical family of 4 in the region. The Child tax credit would be cut in half for the 88,350 families who claim it, guaranteed deductions cut in half, the 66,290 Small Businesses in CA-45 would also be hit with a 43.4% tax rate if the 199A Small Business Deduction expires, the Alternative Minimum Tax will return, and Family-Owned Farms in CA-45 would have their Death Tax Exemption slashed in half next year, Ways and Means reports.
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Good work Katy!
Perhaps the CaGOP will grow some and use this in campaigns to get rid of these self centered people.
The CaDems unite to hopefully not provide DJT with a win.
Soooooo selfish!
The criminal Democrat mafia views taxpayers as patsies who they can easily steal from and exploit? They do so without any remorse? They’ve sold their souls to the dark side?
What’s up with these two Democrats, Rep. Adam Gray and Rep. Derek Trans, whom Katy Grimes identified for exploiting their taxpaying constituents by raising their taxes?
Democrat Rep. Derek Trans grew up in the San Gabriel Valley as the son of Vietnamese refugees who fled Vietnam after the communists took over. When he turned 18, Tran enlisted in the United States Army where he spent eight years serving. Tran then attended Bentley University, graduating with a B.S., and a J.D. from Glendale University College of Law. In 2012, he moved to Orange County and opened started his own law firm called Tran Law in Huntington Beach in 2020 that focused on personal injury and employment law. In 2023, Feher Law, a practice in Torrance, acquired Tran’s firm. Tran also co-owns a pharmacy in Anaheim with his wife. At the end of 2023, Tran announced that he run for California’s 45th congressional district. Tran supposedly defeated Republican incumbent Michelle Steel in the general election by just 653 votes out of nearly 316,000 cast, and the race was one of the closest of the election cycle. Tran said he considers abortion to be a “number one issue” in his district stating that he would vote for abortion rights at the federal level and that he supports Planned Parenthood. It’s ironic that someone like Derek Tran, whose parents fled communism and who owns a business, would join the communist Democrat party and vote for higher taxes on his taxpaying constituents?
Democrat Rep. Adam Gray’s bio claims that he supposedly grew up working in his family’s dairy supply and feed store in Merced. He attended Merced College before earning his bachelor’s degree in political science from the University of California, Santa Barbara. He’s been a Democrat apparatchik his entire working career having previously worked as a staffer for various Democrat lawmakers such as Democrat Assembly member Dennis Cardoza and Democrat State Senator Ron Calderon. In August 2023, Gray announced his candidacy against Republican Rep. John Duarte in the 2024 election. Following weeks of counting, Gray eventually took the lead over Duarte on November 26, 2024, by a margin of just 182 votes, with the race being called on December 4, 2024 being the last congressional race to be called in the 2024 election. Any white man like Adam Gray is who still in the communist Democrat party has to be corrupt to the core?
Yes, TJ. In both cases, Trans and Gray, if vote counting had been completed within 72 hours of polls closing their Republican rivals would have won. Vote harvesting and curing (also known as Adjudication in Dominion systems) continued until additional votes were able to be tallied for the the two DemocRats to steal the elections.
It’s part the plan to make everyone who’s not “rich” (the “rich” being the filthy rich leftists that fund the democrats and their agenda) made equal by being equally mired in poverty and fully dependent on and unquestionably submissive to the government. And until the largely urban “rabble” realizes this there will be no change in course for the democrat pillagers.
Mr. Moore, if Trump wanted the tax cuts to be made permanent in his first term, why didn’t he just make them permanent instead of expiring. I think he planned to get a consecutive term and lay this debt bomb off on a future President. Well, he is now the President and has to deal with this serious problem. However, I do like his plan to enact a 10% duty on imports, regardless. This will help alleviate the debt problem to a degree. Good luck in the mid-terms.