On today’s BradCast: If you were unclear about taxes being way too low on millionaires and billionaires, the amount of money being spent by fewer than a dozen of those billionaires to lie to voters in opposition to a one-time tax on billionaires in California, should make that point clearer than ever. [Audio link to full show follows this post.]
FIRST UP: Despite Donald Trump‘s ridiculous declaration late last week that his war on Iran has been “terminated”, it decidedly has not been. Oil prices continue to rise as the Strait of Hormuz is still shut down, choking off 20% of the world’s oil and gas supplies; the U.S. is now firing on Iranian boats in the Persian Gulf; and Iran is launching drone attacks against U.S. Naval vessels and oil assets in the UAE. Other than that, it’s totally “terminated”, so no need to enforce the 60-day time limits of the federal War Powers Act. Enjoy your vacation this week, Congressional Republicans!
THEN: Special taxes on millionaires are growing in popularity around the country. Over the past two months, new wealth taxes on millionaires have been enacted in Washington state and in Maine, adding to a list that already includes California, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Maryland, Minnesota and the District of Columbia.
Last week, supporters of a ballot measure to establish a one-time 5% surcharge on anyone with a net worth above $1 billion in California, announced they’ve obtained more than enough signatures to place the measure on the ballot this November. The labor union proponents of the new tax say that it will raise about $100 billion in revenue to be largely used to offset federal cuts to healthcare for low-income residents under the Trump Administration.
But, of course, about a dozen billionaires, led by Google’s co-founder Sergey Brin — are leading the charge to misinform Golden State voters about the measure, and about their own ballot proposition meant to counter it. The disinformation campaign, “Building a Better California,” has raised more than $90 million from fewer than a dozen donors, including Brin’s own $57 million. It began months ago by blanketing state voters with cryptically worded mailers and texts falsely claiming their campaign was about fighting government waste. “We can’t afford more wasteful spending!,” the mailers warn, suggesting proponents of the billionaire tax effort want to tax your net wealth. That, of course, is only true if you happen to be one of California’s 200 or so billionaires, in a state of about 40 million people.
Last year, we spoke with HAROLD MEYERSON, Editor-at-Large at The American Prospect and a years-long former California journalist, about the Billionaire Tax proposal as the signature-gathering effort was just getting off the ground. He joins us again today to discuss the effort as its proponents announce they’ve got enough signatures to qualify for this year’s ballot. We discuss both the pros and cons of the measure, as well as the well-funded disinformation campaign against it.
“They argue that the wealth tax is ‘unprecedented,'” Meyerson tells me about it’s billionaire-led critics. “Well, a property tax is a wealth tax. Everybody who owns a home is essentially paying a wealth tax with the relative limited means available to homeowners. So, wealth taxes are fine, apparently, for the general public and are routinely inflicted and nobody raises the issue. But apply it to the investments of the state’s 200-some odd billionaires — some of them very odd — you get a cry of protest that wealth taxes are ‘unheard of.'”
“The wealth tax is really intended to reflect this particular massive change in the American economy. It used to be that the top 10% did 33% of all consumer spending in the United States. The broad middle did almost 50%. Now those figures are almost precisely reversed. The top 10% is now doing 50% by value of the purchasing in the American economy, and the bottom 80% is back down to 30% of the buying,” he explains.
“Things like the wealth tax, things like what the state of Washington and the state of Maine have done, are simply attempts to address where the money has gone — the money that we need to run a decent nation with occasionally affordable health care, retirement benefits, accessible public education, and things like that.”
On the other side of the argument, even some like Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom claim to be opposed to the measure, though Meyerson chalks it up to his need for big money supporters to fund his Presidential ambitions. Nonetheless, while it’s unknowable at the moment, there could be some merit to the argument that so many billionaires might leave the state — or refuse to move in — that it actually ends up harming the state’s tax base rather than helping it. Newsom argues, therefore, that it can’t be done by states. It must be done with a national tax.
“Newsom is right in as much as a national wealth tax would be more effective than a state wealth tax. But this election is really almost about the whole idea of a wealth tax. And you ain’t gonna get a national wealth tax unless some states start enacting them,” Meyerson argues. “And, of course, if billionaires want to move out of the United States, they have lost the legal ability to donate to political campaigns. That’s a trade-off I would really welcome.”
Sounds good to me!
NEXT: A quick update on the GOP-controlled states in the South now moving quickly to redraw majority-Black districts out of their state’s U.S. House maps following last week’s horrific Callais ruling by the corrupted U.S. Supreme Court, gutting what little is left of the Voting Rights Act. That includes states such as Louisiana and Alabama which are actually attempting to suspend their ONGOING primaries — in which people are ALREADY voting for U.S. House candidates! — in order to remove the possibility of minorities electing Representatives of their choosing in 2026.
FINALLY: Speaking of California, elections and this year’s Primaries: a warning about voting by mail too late in the Golden State’s June 2nd statewide primary for Governor and much more. A recent analysis by the L.A. Times found that the number of ballots arriving too late to be tallied had quadrupled across the state between the 2024 Presidential election and last November’s Special Election for Prop 50 (to redistrict the state in response to Trump-order mid-decade gerrymanders in Texas and elsewhere.)
The problem appears to be related to procedural changes at the U.S. Postal Service. Ironically enough, it appears to be disproportionately harming rural voters, who tend to vote for Republicans.
But with vote-by-mail ballots now arriving in voter mailboxes across the state, and many Democratic-leaning voters perhaps waiting for a front-runner to emerge in CA’s 71-person(!) all-party, top-two primary, before voting…just be careful about waiting too long to drop that ballot into a mailbox!
For that matter, as always, we strongly recommend against mailing back your ballot, Do so only in the event that it is your only option. Instead, I strongly urge you to vote with a hand-marked paper ballot — using the mail-in ballot sent to you is fine — but drop it off in person at an early voting location, or drop-box, or at the polls on Election Day to maximize the odds of your ballot being counted, and counted as cast!…
Why is it one time only? Make it permanent!
Of course, that’s just what it’s opponent fear will happen if it is allowed to happen one time.