Wealthy GOP Donors Reward Republicans for Giving Them Tax Breaks

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
Monday, August 20, 2018

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WASHINGTON, D.C. — Republican donors and corporate interests who benefited from the tax law are spending millions of dollars propping up candidates who voted for the law. As the tax law becomes less and less popular, Republicans are more reluctant to embrace the measure on the campaign trail—but that hasn’t stopped the very same donors who pushed for the law to reward the lawmakers who made it a reality.

See coverage below: 

Wealthy donors who benefitted from the Republican tax law have been rewarding GOP candidates with millions of dollars in campaign contributions. 

• The New York Times: “Republicans are struggling to make the $1.5 trillion Trump tax cuts a winning issue with voters in the midterm congressional elections, but the cuts are helping the party in another crucial way: unlocking tens of millions of dollars in campaign donations from the wealthy conservatives and corporate interests that benefited handsomely from it.”
• Politico: “The Senate Leadership Fund, American Crossroads, One Nation and Crossroads GPS — the four outside groups supported by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell — have raised nearly $100 million this election cycle. That far exceeds the $68.3 million the groups had raised in 2016 over the same time period.”

While worker wages remain flat, CEO pay skyrockets and stock buybacks balloon, thanks to the GOP tax law. 

• Newsweek: “The average CEO of the largest 350 companies in the U.S. received $18.9 million in compensation last year, up from $16 million in 2016. The main difference in pay came from stock awards and cashed-in stock options, not salary growth, the analysis found.”
• Politico: “Some of the biggest winners from President Donald Trump’s new tax law are corporate executives who have reaped gains as their companies buy back a record amount of stock, a practice that rewards shareholders by boosting the value of existing shares.”
• Vox: “The Republican tax cuts have been great for corporations, which have spent billions of the dollars they’ve reaped in savings buying up their own stock to reward shareholders and investors. Corporate executives and insiders are taking advantage of the stock buyback boom to sell shares they own to the companies they work for, profiting handsomely. Companies are spending millions or billions of dollars to reward shareholders and prop up their stock prices with buybacks, even if that means laying off workers to do it.”

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